Elita One, 28 Times
by Meiza
Summary: 28 Character Meme, "Disheveled". When two armies that have been operating independently for four million plus years converge, corporate culture clash is inevitable. Oh dear.
1. Bathtime

**Meme:** Bathtime

**Universe:** G1

**Warnings:** Elita experiences culture shock.

**Summary:** The twins show Elita what they insist is the single most redeeming feature of the human culture. Elita is inclined to disagree.

* * *

"What a surprisingly nice day. I could be using it for a private cruise in the city, check out the races, see the auto show, something nice and big outside. Sure, the ground is still a little muddy from the rain last night, but that's easy enough to avoid in the city. But gosh darn it, too bad it's not my day off, today would have been a great day for one. Oh wait, hold on, today was _supposed_ to be my day off. I wonder what happened? Hm, maybe it had SOMETHING to do with a certain idiotic red Lamborghini who will remain nameless for getting ME wrapped up in HIS punishment for HIS stupidity!"

"I _said_ I was sorry! How what I supposed to know Prowl would find me out so fast?"

"Maybe because he ALWAYS finds you out? Maybe because EVERYONE can always figure you out?! Maybe because it's getting to a point where when anything goes wrong, you practically get a neon sign hanging over your head screaming 'I did it, punish me with mind numbing menial labor, and be _sure to send my brother along for the ride'_?!"

"Oh come on, that's not fair. It's not like I'm the only prankster in the whole Ark. I had nothing to do with the water balloon catapult in Optimus' quarters, need I remind you!"

"No, but he was stupid enough to actually paint 'Air Raid was here!' on the wall. YOU can't even cover your tracks right even when you try."

"Hey, I wiped away all evidence I had anything to do with it. I left the scene spotless of incriminating evidence!"

"Obviously not, because we're on wide patrol for three weeks straight now. And _why am I here too_?? I didn't DO anything!"

"Well, you pointed and laughed. That might've had something to do with it."

"Shut up you General Motors reject."

"Hah! Make me, Suuunshiiiine!"

"Don't call me that you pitslagger!"

"You are my sunshiiine, my only sunshiiiine, you make me haaaappy, when skies are grey-"

"Shut up or I'll personally reformat you into a toaster!"

"Your momma's a toaster!"

The yellow sports car swerved and none too gently bumped against the red one, not hard enough to force him off the road, but enough for an unpleasant shove. The red Lamborghini was quick to retaliate with a harder shove.

"Watch it! You dent me, you won't make it back to base."

"Oh please, like you'd do anything to risk your precious paintjob – _Suuunshiiiiine_!"

With an inarticulate roar Sunstreaker rammed harder into his twin, both of their speeds picking up as they bumped back and forth at high speeds down the mercifully empty street.

"Children, behave, before I make you sit in the corner." A dry voice intervened.

Well, almost empty.

Both twins stopped as they suddenly remembered the light pink 1984 Chevrolet Corvette shadow behind them.

"He started it." Sideswipe said sulkily.

"ME? This is all YOUR fault to begin with, remember?"

"My fault? You're the one who started needling me in the first place!"

"You're the one who might as well have begged for extra duties from Prowl for the both of us, AND ON MY DAY OFF!!"

Elita sighed as the 'conversation' degenerated back to arguing and childish name calling that made absolutely no sense (what was with all the 'your momma' comments? Didn't they have the same creators?). She briefly considered breaking them up, but they seemed pretty familiar with this sort of interaction, so unless it got especially bad or distracting, she might as well let them get it out of their systems. Besides, they were fun to watch sometimes, and the entertainment value was almost the entire point of her being here.

Several weeks ago, she had come to Earth with a small team to assist in the initial construction and ground work of what would become Autobot city. This was especially important, because it would allow for the safe transportation of personnel, engergon, materials, and supplies back and forth between the armies. Elita's main job was to help set up a system to make it all run smoothly. Such a system would require dozens of individuals working together, needing a system that would allow for communication and easy transition. To set up such a vital system required much careful planning. Careful planning, in turn, required meetings.

Lots…

…and lots…

…and LOT'S of meetings.

By the time Optimus casually suggested Elita join in on a patrol and get out of the base for a few hours as a break, she had been about ready to lose her famous self-control and blast her own head off during the next meeting just to break up the processor-killing monotony.

Prowl had asked her, since she was going to be joining a patrol anyway, if she would be so kind as to keep an eye on the twins and make sure they finished their patrol before they beat each other up or got distracted by something bright and shiny.

Elita still wasn't entirely if the tactician was joking or not.

_Much better than another meeting_, Elita decided, amused as the insults became more colorful and anatomically improbable. Firestar would have approved.

Not to mention, it really was a nice day, as Sunstreaker had sarcastically observed earlier. The heavy rain last night had cleansed the air, making colors brighter and giving everything a clean, fresh smell that Elita had never experienced before, Cybertron utterly lacking the organic life and non-acidic showers to make such a phenomenon possible. The brand new sensation almost left her feeling giddy, and not even the twins arguing about Sideswipes accountability for Sunstreakers lost time could spoil her good mood.

Then the road blew up.

All three Autobots cried out in surprise as they swerved and fishtailed to avoid the sudden explosion and newly formed crater in the road, debris and bits of cement raining down on their roofs. Above, all three of them could hear jet engines flying past, as three familiar forms – red, blue, and purple – streaked past.

"Seekers!" Sideswipe exclaimed, sounding FAR too happy about it.

"The Command Trine," Elita identified, sounding far less enthused.

"And here I thought today was going to be a total waste." Sunstreaker added, sounding darkly pleased.

The three Autobots transformed as the jets circled back around.

"I'm calling base for back up," Elita said, her hand already going to her comm…

…only to be stopped by Sideswipes hand.

"What? No! That's no fun! I need my Jet Judo quota! We can handle these guys just fine on our own, trust me!"

"Jet…Judo…quota…?"

"Fight now, explain later." Sunstreaker said curtly.

* * *

The fight proved to be quick but intense. The twins had grabbed onto their targets (Thundercracker and Skywarp) with glee, holding on with incredible tenacity no matter how hard the Seekers tried to throw them off – which left Elita with Starscream.

Joy.

"Give it up Elita One! I've already bested you once, spare yourself the humiliation of another defeat and give up already!" Starscream called out in mocking glee, dropping a cluster bomb almost on top of her. She barely managed to dodge out of the way to avoid the main blast, though the explosions sent her flying. She shot at him a few times with her blaster, but he evaded her easily and was already coming back around for another pass.

This wasn't going to work, her shooting from the ground and him in the air. He had all the advantages, and she simply couldn't keep up with him. With the twins already occupied and the Ark so far away, she was completely on her own. Clearly, a drastic change in tactic was going to be needed very shortly.

She spared a glance at Sunstreaker, tearing at the blue Seekers wings even as the Decepticon went in a barrel roll in an attempt to dislodge his unwanted passenger.

Well, if it worked for them…

A high pitched, outraged screech pierced through the air, and out of the corner of his optic Sideswipe was just able to catch a glance of Starscream zipping by with something pink on his back.

The red twin laughed maniacally at the newest convert to Jet Judo. He was feeling ridiculously pleased with himself right about now.

The fight was quick to end after that, with Starscream calling for a 'Retreat! Retreat! Get this insane femme OFF OF ME!'

Taking their cue (because it's not like they particularly wanted to ride all the way back to the 'con base), the twins hopped off their Seekers as they turned tail and ran as best they could with damaged wings and some such. Sideswipe used his jetback to land safely just half way down a moderately steep hill, Sunstreaker hitting slick dirt closer to the top. Sideswipe looked around for their third member, never noticing his brothers difficulty in remaining upright on the wet mud uphill.

Elita tried to jump off the Air Commander, but she was still a Jet Judo novice and instead sent herself tumbling helplessly off Starscreams back, spiraling down to the unforgiving ground nearly a hundred feet below her, a potentially fatal fall depending how she landed. She immediately curled up the best she could to protect her head and braced for impact.

Instead of hitting tree branches, rocks, or ground, Elita landed in a pair of arms. She uncurled slightly to see Sideswipes grinning face.

"Hey there. What's a nice dame like you doing in a place like this?" he said, as if they had bumped into each other at a bar.

Elita relaxed and started to smile, about to thank Sideswipe for his catch.

Until Sunstreaker lost his battle against gravity and slid down the hill, crashing straight into Sideswipes legs.

With a yelp Sideswipe fell backwards, his feet going clear into the air as his legs were literally knocked out from under him, Elita getting tossed over his head in the process.

Together, Sunstreaker, Sideswipe, and Elita all slid and tumbled the rest of the way down the steep, muddy hill in an inelegant tangle of limbs.

* * *

"This is an outrage! This is insult to injury! I blame you completely!"

"How is it my fault THIS time??"

"It's your fault I'm out here in the first place. Ergo, by default every bad thing that happens to me is completely your fault."

"YOU'RE the one who knocked ME down!"

"It's still YOUR fault I'm here at all!!"

"Would the both of you _please_ desist in this pointless bickering before I lose what is left of my patience?" Elita said sharply, her optics off lined as she pinched the bridge of her nasal ridge. Their arguing had been entertaining before, but in light of recent events, her patience and tolerance for stupidity had taken a nose dive. Thankfully, the twins caught on that the femme was Not Amused, and quickly shut up.

All three of them had just spent the better part of an hour climbing back up the slick, slippery, muddy hill that kept getting muddier and slicker the more they dug into the dirt and tore away the grass for hand hold and foot holds that kept crumbling under their weight. Sideswipes jetpack had suffered damage on the way down during the roll and tumble, and they were all stuck trying to get back the old fashioned way – on their hands and knees.

Turns out, sports cars, even highly advanced alien ones, weren't well designed for driving uphill on wet muddy slopes with zero traction.

Now, back at the top again, they were all tired, muddy, covered in vegetation and in increasingly sour moods.

Elita pinched her nasal bridge for another second before letting it go and on-lining her optics again.

"I believe it is safe to say that cutting our patrol short would be acceptable," she noted in a tired voice. "Let's just…head back to base to make a report, and so we can rest, repair, and clean up. Not necessarily in that order."

Sunstreaker looked at her in abject horror. "I'm not going back to base looking like _this_!" He gestured wildly at his dripping, muddy frame. "Everyone is going to SEE me!"

Elita shot him a withering glare. "If you want to jump in a river to clean off first, that's your prerogative. I honestly can't be bothered to care."

"Actually…" Sideswipe ventured, "I have an idea that'll make everyone happy."

Sunstreaker brightened, knowing what his brother was thinking. Elita lacked that luxury, and she quirked an optic ridge.

"And that would be…?"

* * *

"…'Andy's Awesome Autobot Autowash?'" the femme read flattly.

"Ye-ep. The carwash: quite possibly the single greatest invention in human history. It used to be just 'Andy's Awesome Autowash,' but he added the Autobot part after we set up a deal with him: we pay the guy a monthly fee, in return for almost exclusive service and special treatment. Heck, Sunstreaker and Tracks alone are probably putting Andy's kids through college."

"Autobot…Autowash…?"

"Okay, the names a little tacky, but you can't deny good service." If he hadn't been in car mode, Sideswipe would have been giving Elita his puppy eye look. "C'mon, you'll like it, trust me. These guys are actually pretty cool. Even Sunny likes them, and THAT'S saying something."

Sunstreaker 'humphed', but otherwise ignored his two companions and drove right up. He went over a long bump on the driveway, sounding off a little bell inside the shop itself and alerting the staff (mostly teens and young adults) to their newest customers. Immediately a middle aged man with curly red hair (Andy?) came out. He brightened upon seeing his most frequent customers.

"Sunstreaker! Sideswipe! Long time no see. It's been, what, almost a week now?"

"Hardy har, very funny," Sideswipe said in good humor, driving up to meet him. "You're killing me, you know that?"

"I'm still trying," the human answered back. He gave both twins and quick look and the unholy mess they brought with them. "Do I want to know?"

"Seekers."

"Ah. The usual, or you gonna be wanting extra?"

"Actually, think you can hook us up with something special? We've got a newbie."

The human glanced back to the corvette behind them. "So we do."

He approached Elita and smiled politely. "Don't think I've seen you here before, but it's always a pleasure meeting a new Autobot. Name's Andy."

"The pleasure is mine. I am Elita One," the femme greeted, already finding herself rather liking the congenial human.

The redhead's – Andy – brows shot up at the feminine voice. "A lady? Well, that DOES warrant special treatment. Wash, wax, the works. Just give me two minutes to set up."

It actually took closer to seven, but Elita wasn't going to correct him on his inaccurate time estimate. The carwash had four automatic carwash lanes, so the three of them were able to be cleaned at the same time.

Admittedly, Elita was a tad nervous going in. Cybertron had no equivalent for this type of service, and going someplace that made a business of _washing_ you…the concept was almost a little bit creepy, at least at first.

She tensed as the water turned on, but was pleasantly surprised. As promised, the wash was fully automated, and Elita's entire frame was caressed with soapy water and soft brushes that washed away almost all the caked on mud. Elita felt herself relaxing, almost lulled by the rhythmic motions and soft brushes that were part wash, part massage over the next five minutes. She was actually slightly disappointed when it ended so soon. It was no wonder the twins liked this place so much, blatantly tacky names aside. She made a mental note to come back here again, if the situation presented itself.

Then things got weird.

Exiting the wash, still dripping wet, she was surprised to be greeted by six human teens and young adults, armed with buckets, sponges, and an assortment of towels.

"Hello?" Elita said, a tad uncertainly. To her alarm, the young humans surrounded her and – to her shock – were _rubbing_ her _all over_ with sponges and towels and warm soapy water, getting into seams and curves with embarrassing meticulousness.

"W-what are you _doing_?" Elita asked, not quite able to stop the high pitch at the last word.

A brown haired female beamed brightly at her grill. "Part of the special treatment ma'am. The regular wash isn't going to get all the grit out. We're doing the fine detail, so to speak. Just relax, and we'll get you so polished up, you're going to practically shine by the time you roll out of here."

"That…that is very…kind of you, but not necessary," Elita forced out as a dozen little hands rubbed and scrubbed every part of her, determined not to leave a single speck of mud trapped anywhere, their touches, rubs, and caresses bordering almost on intimate.

The girl, ignorant of Elita's distress, waved off the protest. "Don't worry, we're happy to do it. You know Tracks? I think this is his favorite part, he just _loves_ to be pampered."

'Pampered' was not the word Elita would have picked, as she felt a sponge being squeezed between the hubcaps of her tires. 'Molested' probably would have been closer.

She stole a look at the Lamborghini's on either side of her. Sunstreaker to her left was silent, the humans covering, cleansing, and polishing him with practiced ease, but his comfort was made abundantly clear when he willingly opened his door so one of the young males could dust off his interior with a cloth. And this was a mech who could barely stand organics on a regular basis! Sideswipe to her right, on the other hand, was more talkative, chatting and joking with the humans as they cleaned him with equal ease and thoroughness. Neither of them seemed the least bit uncomfortable with the treatment and to all appearances they were enjoying it thoroughly.

Of course they were enjoying it. It they didn't like it, they wouldn't have been so eager to come in the first place.

_O-okay, they consider this normal, _Elita told herself, trying her hardest not to squirm as small hands and smaller fingers forced their way into every seam and crevice she didn't even know she HAD._ They are trying to give the best service possible, and this is how they're used to treating Autobots. They mean well, they're trying so hard. It would be rude to throw their kindness back into their faces, and it's not like they _mean_ for it to feel so…uncomfortable. I'm just not used to this sort of treatment, but the other Autobots get it all the time. Just wait it out, wait it out, and I can go home and not embarrass these poor humans, it's not like they know any better, just wait it out, wait it out, wait it – _

One of the workers, deciding to go the extra mile, decided to lie down on his stomach and wipe down a part of her undercarriage.

* * *

"_Optimus Prime, you're going to be needed at the Ark entrance."_

The Prime glanced up upon hearing his Security Director's voice on his comm. In spite of his occasional spats of almost extreme paranoia, Red Alert could be depended on to remain calm and rational in a real emergency, hence why he was able to become Security Director in the first place.

"What is it?" Optimus asked, getting up anyway and heading towards the entrance.

"_It's Elita."_

The Prime felt a stab of panic quickened his pace. "Is she damaged? Were they attacked?"

"_No, I don't think so. She seems fine, but we won't know for sure until she gets here."_

"So she's contacted you to say she's on her way? Did she say why?"

"_She hasn't contacted me at all, and she won't respond to anything I say. All I know is, I'm looking at her on the security feed coming in faster than I have ever seen her drive, but she's not being pursued, she's not saying anything, and if she can drive that fast and that straight, she's probably not damaged, not seriously anyway. It's also most assuredly her, I ran every scan I have and there's no way it's a Decepticon decoy or trick. Honestly, I was hoping you might know what's going on."_

"I'll have to admit to ignorance then," Optimus said. "But I will let you know as soon as I do. Open the doors and let her in."

_"Very well. Opening doors now."_

Optimus arrived to the front entry of the Ark a few seconds later, to find a handful of mechs and a couple of Elita's femmes milling around. Slowly, a roaring engine sound faded in, growing louder and louder as it came closer, and all conversation slowly died as everyone stopped and looked around for the source, all wondering 'who is that?'

With a screech of tires the pink corvette appeared as if out of thin air, speeding through the door as fast as if she had the entire Decepticon fleet after, driving and twisting through the fast room and barely missing crashing into legs half a dozen times over, though it was more due to their quick reflexes than any attempts of hers.

Prime stood his ground as Elita made a beeline for him at 90 mph. Not even slowing down, she went from a mad car _*transform_* to an angrily stomping femme with only the slightest hitch in movement, marching right past Prime and getting right up into the stunned and confused Prowls face.

"The next time you suggest I go anywhere with the twins, I may very well have no choice but to shoot you." She hissed.

Prowl blinked.

With a growl, Elita continued past him, heedless of the small crowed she left stunned silent. The door opened to reveal Tracks, who startled at the fuming femme, took note of her dust covered frame, caught a few words she was muttering venomously under her breath, and drew his own conclusions as to the source of her foul mood.

"If you need to clean up, the wash racks are usually empty around now, you can clean up in private," he mentioned helpfully.

Elita whipped around and killed him dead with her GLARE of DEATH.

While Tracks trembled in a trembling fit of mechly terror behind Irohnide, Elita stalked on, radiating dark anger in palpable waves and sending lesser mechs into hiding. Somehow or other, she managed to slam the automatic door behind her.

Everyone stood silently for several seconds.

"_Prime?"_

"Yes Red Alert?"

"_I just contacted Sunstreaker and Sideswipe. I asked them what's going on, and they claim ignorance of what just happen, citing only that they were getting cleaned up at the local wash when Elita 'freaked out' and sped off in the middle of the service for no discernable reason."_

"…Prowl?"

"Yes Prime?"

"As soon as Sideswipe and Sunstreaker get back, send them to my office, immediately."

"Yes Prime."

* * *

**Important**! I need femmes to populate the Femme Division, since I can't just keep working with the same four all the time. Rather than come up with a whole bunch myself, I thought it might be more fun to have guest appearences of my readers OC's (you know you have one).

If you want your OC to make a guest appearance, drop me a message with a name, bio, and short history. Please try to keep the history to one paragraph, and include any special skills or ranks – demolitions, codebreaker, communications, medic, frontline fighter – as well as any points you think are important to the characterization. Like, say, they were originally Decepticon built but defected, or have no memory past a certain time, or whatever. There are a LOT of positions to fill in an army, and I need variety!

Due credit will be given, as will links if they appear in a fan story or art, naturally. Anyone who drops a review as well will be given special consideration. *Is so completely shameless.*


	2. Book Reading

**Meme:** Book Reading

**Universe:** G1, pre-Earth

**Warnings:** Very short, drabble sized even, but sweet enough to induce cavities. Read at your own risk.

**Summer:** In which Elita demonstrates the vital skill of multi-tasking that all leaders must have.

* * *

Most people (well, most species actually) wouldn't be able to comprehend how a war could last for 5,000,000+ years none stop at an almost stalemate. Then again, most species, once they took an actual look at the history of the war, wouldn't have categorized it as one long war, so much as a series of smaller battles. The Great War was characterized by a long stretch of quiet tie for about half a vorn, tops, followed by maybe another half vorn of frenti fighting, followed by another relatively quiet time while both sides licked their woulds and MEgatron came up with his next Big Plan. This was probably the biggest reason for the longevity for the war, really.

This is not to say either side was idle during this time. The lull periods were a time when espionage and preparations were at their peak as everyone readied for the next battle.

Of course, all the intelligence gathering, preparations, supply runs/thefts, and weapon developments made for lots of reports that were absolutely vital for the command staff to be updated on…or so Elita inferred from the daunting tower of data pads on the desk, nearly all marked "URGENT!"

Of course they were all urgent. If they weren't, somone lower on the chain would have taken care of it by now.

Elita covered her optics with one hand, counted to five, wished very very hard, and open her optics again. Nope, the reports were all still there, and if anything the pile looked a little bit bigger.

"I swear that thing is alive. It's the only way it can keep growing every time I turn around," she muttered. With a sign, Elita picked a datapad at random and returned to her berth, where her pillow and a cube of mid-grade energon were waiting for her. If she was going to be stuck for the next few joors reading these things, then she was going to be comfortable for it.

Settling into her comfy place, Elita scanned over her chosen reading material. To her joy, she had picked up something from Jazz, probably about his most recent mission. While he tended to wander a bit in his writings and almost seemed to be writing as he was thinking (leading to the most unusual tangents in the middle of his briefings), at least his reports weren't as dry as Prowl or as meticulously, mind-numbingly detailed as Red Alerts. Though to be fair, both of their reports were probably going to be a lot shorter; Jazz's mission had lasted for nearly three orns and had been unexpectedly fruitful. The data pad had enough data to fill a small book file, really.

_It probably would have become a best seller too_, Elita noted, already getting drawn into Jazz's colorful and occasionally bizarre adventure. She had a good laugh now and then.

Snuggling a bit deeper into her nice warm pillow, she scrolled down to the next page.

"Go back a little, I wasn't done reading." Her pillow protested.

"I wasn't aware you were such a slow reader," she teased.

"I'm not slow, just careful," her pillow insisted. "I like to absorb what I'm reading, not just try to get through as fast as I can, thank you very much."

Elita rolled her optics in fake exasperation, but complied and went back a little so Optimus could finish reading over her shoulder.

Currently, the Prime had his back to the wall, and Elita's back against his chest, with his arms around her waist and the femme sitting between his legs, reading the data pad she held high in her hands over her head. True, he could have gotten his own data pad, but that wouldn't have been nearly as nice, and what with how busy they've both been recently, they were dead set on squeezing in _some_ time together outside of war meetings.

Multi-tasking was a vital skill for all leaders, even if it was something as simple as squeezing in reading reports and the all important cuddle time.

* * *

**AN:** The idea came to be after I saw a certain picture on deviantart, done by Ty-chou (check it out at http:// ty-chou. deviantart. com /art /TF- Multitasking - 112823293, and be sure to remove the spaces when you copy and paste the address).

And don't forget, dear, readers, I need femmes! :)


	3. Dominant

**Meme:** "Dominant"

**Warnings:** None, really. Here, 'dominant' is going to be more a matter of will power.

**Universe:** (Very) Pre-movie. Same universe as TPWIP, but no prior familiarity needed.

**Summary:** Elita meets the future Prime and Lord High Protector for the first time, and tries to say calm. Surely, the rumors had been exaggerated, right? Right?

_**Time units:** "orn" is equivilant to a day (about two earth weeks), "vorn" to a year (about 83 earth years) and "joor" to an hour (six earth hours)._

* * *

Elita stared at the innocent door for the longest time. She had come a little early, and had fully intended to walk right into that room without hesitation, full of confidence for her waiting audience, not a shred of doubt or fear. She would know that, though there were so many others that were older and more experienced than her, she had still been hand-picked by Sentinel Prime himself for this task, this duty that would dominate her professional life for the next few vorns, a duty that was far greater than anything she had done before.

She was ready.

She was confidant.

She was proud.

She was…she was…

Oh who was she kidding, she was as nervous as the Pit!

What was she thinking, accepting this job?! What she completely insane? What reason did they have to give a whit about what she had to say? She heard the rumors of what had happened to the other's, most of them had barely lasted four or five orns. The hardiest one lasted for nearly eight, and no one's seen him since. And she thought _she could do this_?? Sure, she was good at her job, but she was the youngest and least experienced of all those in her field. She just lucked out with good instincts – how was she supposed to do _this_?? For goodness sakes, she would pet half her annual paycheck that the biggest reason she recieved this assignment at all was because everyone else had already been terrorized into a mental institution, and the rest where smart enough to dissapear whenever Sentinal came a-calling for more suicidal, that is, "willing" volunteers!

_Calm down_, _Elita_, she reprimanded herself with a scowl. _You are blowing this out of proportion. Remember, they are not gods, they are young mechs, younger than you even, and Sentinel Prime would not ask this of you if he did not believe you could do this. _

Right, right, that was all right…besides, if she messed up, what's the worst that could happen?

She'd make a fool of herself in front of the two future most powerful, influential mechs on all of Cybertron, be driven to near insanity, loose her credentials, and probably completely kill her young career to boot.

Before she could give herself any more time to wander down THAT path again, and all the dire implications that illustrated themselves oh so colorfully in her mental theatre, she palmed the key pad to open the door with a swish. Instantly, two mechs looked up at her, one a dull silver, the other red and blue. To her surprise, even standing they were both barely her height.

Actually, she 'knew' they would be on the small side, but it was still weird seeing it for herself, and knowing who they were, and what they would become. Though to be fair, they were still unusually large for mechs at their current stage of development.

The soon to be Lord High Protector and Prime still had a vorn and a half to go before they would take up the positions they had been sparked, built, and trained for from the moment they were on-lined. When that happened, they would be upgraded into their final forms, which had already been in the works in terms of design and development for several vorns now, and would continue to be worked on until the final few joors before the Ascension Ceremony. When that happened, Elita had no doubt that both brothers would tower over her easily, and she was quite tall for a femme.

"Good morning," Elita said pleasantly, coming in and letting the door close behind her. "My apologies if I kept you waiting."

The red and blue one – Optimus – gave a small smile and nod. "Its fine, it wasn't long."

"We shouldn't have been kept waiting at all," the silver one – Megatron – groused. Optimus gave him a long suffering look, which Megatron matched for a few seconds before rolling his optics. "But, perhaps a few minutes either way is not is not a terrible offense."

Optimus sighed at the almost-but-not-quite-apology, as if he knew this was as good as it was going to get. Elita had to refrain from grinning in amusement, already relaxing with the familiarity the brothers displayed with each other. It made them a little easier to relate to, to see them in metal and wire and not as abstract stories and reputations. Perhaps the rumors had been exaggerated after all, and now she felt ridiculous for having bought into them in the least. They weren't so bad...so far.

"I suppose you both already know why you are here," she said, still pleasant and friendly – and she was totally not stalling, nope, not at all.

"We were told we would be meeting our instructor for current politics and diplomacy," Optimus answered, like a good student (good sign!). "Though, Sentinel didn't tell us who, exactly, we were waiting for."

"You're the aide, right?" Megatron guessed. "You must be, you're too young to be anything else. What's taking our instructor so long to get here, anyway?

Well, here it goes.

"Actually, I AM the instructor."

Megatron stared at her incredulously, and then barked out a short, unamused laugh. "If this is a joke, it's not a funny one. You can't be more than three vorns older than us! What makes _you_ think you're good enough to teach _us_ anything?"

(bad sign! bad sign! bad sign!)

The hostility and arrogance, the utter conviction that the femme in front of him could not possibly be worth his time, coming from the future Lord High Proctor, who was to be feared while the Prime was to be beloved, who was **already** so far up the power pyramid that Elita was practically a speck in comparison, was almost enough to rattle Elita. She was half ready to step back and apologize. Just barely, her training stopped her, and she was able to say her next words without letting the fear in her processors strike a waver in her voice.

"I assure you, Megatron, I am quite serious. If you find my teaching skills lacking, you are welcome to bring your concerns to Sentinel."

Oh Primus, what had possessed her to say THAT? Was she ASKING to be fired on Day 1?!

(Abandon hope, all ye who enter!)

Megatron crossed his arms and, in spite of the height difference being marginally in her favor, managed to look down at Elita in a way that made her feel small and stupid. How did Megatron manage to put himself on a plane above anyone he talked to, so quickly and effortlessly? No wonder the other instructors barely lasted a few orns, Elita couldn't imagine putting up with that sort of mental assault constantly.

"You honestly think you're important enough for me to make a fuss over? Don't flatter yourself; I already know your lessons are going to be a complete waste of my time. Diplomacy is the Prime's arena, not the Protectors."

"Megatron!" Optimus exclaimed, appalled by the blatant disrespect. Elita herself was torn between humiliation and shock. Humiliation demanded she apologize and make a quick escape with as much of her dignity intact as possible. Shock demanded answers. Fortunately, shock won out.

"Do you honestly believe the future Lord High Protector does not need to learn the nuances of current politics and the subtleties of diplomacy?" she asked incredulously. How could he be so incredibly (and she could NOT believe she was using the word to describe someone who was already freaking her out beyond belief)…_naive_?

Megatron didn't even bother looking at Elita, appearing already bored with the conversation.

"My duties will be regarding the law and peace keeping forces, and I fully intend to protect and enforce the laws and met out justice with an iron fist. I will not deny that diplomacy and compromise has its place," Megatron gave a nod to Optimus, "when it comes to certain matters, but it is not with me or the laws. Cybertron does not need a weakling for a Protector."

"Cybertron needs a brute even less." Elita shot back before she even had time to think.

Megatron whipped his head around and stared at her, speechless. Optimus looked like he didn't know if he wanted to gape in shock or laugh. Elita kept her blank diplomatic mask on, even as she mentally wailed _oh dear sweet Primus what is wrong with meeee?_

The moment passed quickly, and Megatron's condescending boredom was being replaced by more dangerous annoyance and anger.

"What did you call me?" He softly growled, and his hand actually flexed against his arm in a way that just happened to showcase the long fingers and sharp claws. Elita had actually started to shift her weight to step back defensively. Optimus stood, and while he didn't physically come between them, his stance to the side was clearly defensive in Elita's favor.

"That's enough Megatron," he said firmly. "I won't let you terrorize another instructor so quickly."

Megatron snorted. "Like you honestly believe she'll be any better than the others anyway."

No, no, she couldn't let it start like this. She couldn't show any weakness now, not on day one, not on day one million. She gave any ground now she would never be able to get it back. She could not, would not, lose this round.

But if she wanted to win, she'd have to do it on her own.

"Optimus, would you please step out for a few moments?" She asked. The red and blue mech gave her a look of blank surprise, and even Megatron seemed a little taken aback by the unexpected and bold request.

"Are you sure?" Optimus asked carefully.

"I assure, Optimus, I am quite capable of defending myself. Now, please step out and allow me to speak to your brother alone. I will call you back in when we are finished."

Optimus hesitated, clearly not wanting to leave her to the 'tender' mercies of his harsher brother. He gave his brother a warning look, and then walked past Elita and out the door. Neither Elita nor Megatron broke eye contact the whole time, waiting until the door swished shut, leaving the two of them alone.

Before Megatron could say another demeaning, cutting thing, Elita beat him to the punch in a pre-emptive strike.

"Contrary to what you seem to think, I am not here to teach you how to do your job," she said. "_My_ job is to make sure you know how to keep your head above the noise and stay one step ahead of everyone else, to sift through the fogs of misinformation and rumor and find the gems of valuable knowledge and accurate details. In short, I am here to make sure you know how to not be completely buried by those who would use your youth and inexperience to make you do what _they_ want, not what is best for Cybertron."

Elita took a daring step forward, flickering confidence boosting as she kept going.

"The laws are not meant to be compromised, this is true. But I am not here to merely teach you how to play nice and make everyone happy. That was _never_ my intent. I fully intend to teach you how to turn every situation, every negotiation, and every conversation even, to your benefit."

Oh, how she relished the look of shock on Megatrons face. He wasn't expecting that, was he?

Elita slyly grinned. "I did not get to where I am, so quickly, by playing 'nice' all the time either. Of course, I will not encourage you toward unethical practices, but you will be surprised how much leeway exists. I can teach you the webs of power, how to manipulate the threads, how to convince minds, gain loyalty, keep loyalties, and turn loyalties towards yourself. You are inheriting the position of Lord High Protector, but respect and power are not so easily conferred. That is where I come in."

Megatron frowned. "You speak as if I have to EARN my authority. Optimus and I are going to become the two highest ranking mechs on all of Cybertron. There won't be anyone who can overrule or control us."

Elita held up a finger. "Then here is your first lesson: 'Authority' is not synonymous with 'Superiority'.

"You and Optimus will be the most powerful mechs, yes, but you will not be _all_ powerful. You know that you will have to contend with the Council and the Senate, and you CAN be overturned by a majority vote of one or the other, depending on the issue at hand. This is where politics and cleverness come into play, so that the Council will never be able to bully you or Optimus into becoming their puppets."

Megatrons eyes widened slightly, before they narrowed. A slow grin spread across his face. "You're proposing to teach me the art of manipulation." He said bluntly.

"'Manipulation' is an ugly word, as well as an oversimplification." Elita corrected. "It is more about using all avenues to achieve your goals. You cannot break down all walls, but you can slip through the cracks."

Elita spread her hands. "Of course, if you still feel I have nothing to offer, then it is well within your right and power to dismiss me right now. It will only free me up for Optimus."

Megatron gave her an appraising look, and Elita met it with a calmness that did not quite reach her core. This was it, she was putting everything – her reputation, her career – on the line, in the hands of the mech already known for his harsh judgments and impatience, the mech she had already insulted at least once.

After a small eternity, Megatron ducked his head. "I'm still not convinced you can offer me anything I can't get for myself…but I am curious. Let's see how well you can help me 'use all avenues'."

Elita nodded once in understanding and agreement even as her insides quivered in relief.

"Very well then. I will let Optimus know we are ready to begin."

Elita wasn't stupid. She knew this wouldn't be the last time she and Megatron would have a power struggle such as this, and she wouldn't be surprised if he tested her more than once. She would be walking a fine line between respect for what he will become and authority as his instructor in the here in now. She wasn't Ironhide, she couldn't exactly smash their heads together if they got uppity. She was going to be forced to use all her wits just to keep her position as alpha for the rest of her time as instructor.

But as she paled the key pad to open the door and let the future Prime back in, she swore to herself that no matter what Megatron tried to throw at her, she would not let him win those battle of wills so easily.

She had a feeling he wouldn't want it any other way.

* * *

Remember dear readers, I still need femmes! Right now, I'm in need of a medic and an engineer - but especially a medic. Just send me a message!


	4. Silly

**AN:** This one came to me after reading a bunch of other writers theories regarding Transformers and their genders, or possible lack thereof, and wondering what the TF's would think of it. It almost became Movie-verse, with Sam, Mikaela, Aine, and Nolan doing the talking, but I changed it to G1 because I wouldn't have to use OC's that some readers might not be familiar with.

**Meme:** Silly

**Universe:** G1

**Warnings:** Several theories of TF genders discussed with considerable candor, including slash, but nothing icky. I tried my best to represent all views fairly, and maturity in reading is appreciated. BTW, it'll help if you've seen "Auto-Bop" to understand Raoul points, and maybe "The Girl Who Loved Powerglide".

**Summary:** The humans put their squishy noggins together and ponder Transformer sex and genders, or lack thereof. This can't end well.

* * *

It was a quiet day at the Ark, what with half the crew being out on patrols or PR assignments or other tasks, leaving mostly the scientists and technicians to keep an eye on the home base. Even the Decepticons had been quiet lately, which was probably why Powerglide and Tracks both took it in their heads to (finally) bring their respective humans by for a visit. As luck would have it, three other frequent visitors had come by as well, and all of them were left to their own devices when the mechs were called away for quick jobs.

These five humans in particular had never actually spoken to one another, although they had heard of each other through the Autobots. That they were all here now was sheer coincidence, two of them wanting to visit the Ark (having never been there before and finally getting their respective buddies to extend invites), two were regular visitors anyway, and the last had dropped by because Wheeljack wanted an objective opinion regarding the coding for his latest invention – preferably one more knowledgeable in the matter than Ratchet and a great deal more concise than Perceptor.

Introductions were already done, and even with the wildly varying personalities and backgrounds they were able to get along fairly well. As conversations go, it ebbed and moved and changed topics at random depending on whatever caught their fancy next. Of course, with their aforementioned wildly different personalities and backgrounds, there admittedly was only so much common ground for them all to talk on.

Luckily, that one piece of common ground was pretty fruitful.

"So…you and Powerglide?" Raoul asked, for the third time. The brunette rolled her eyes and exchanged an exasperated look with her fellow female.

"Yes Raoul. Me and Powerglide. Get over it. If it hurts your head, go lie down and try not to strain too hard."

"But…but, how would that _work_? And _why_? I mean, you're different species and all, so why…?"

"Well, for me, I just thought the Autobots were just so cool, and Powerglide was something else all together – so daring and confident, and while he likes to complain, he's a real sweetheart underneath. So really, it's not that strange. As for how…"

Astoria smirked and quirked her brow. "Do you REALLY want to know?"

Very strange and disturbing images danced around the poor Latino boys head. "No…no, not really."

"Well the tricky was getting his -"

"FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THINGS GOOD AND HOLY, **DON'T**!!!"

The others laughed heartily at Raoul's expense, the poor guy covering his head before Astoria could taint his delicate virgin ears (not that they were particularly keen on hearing the details either – some things were best left to the imagination). Carly calmed as a thought occurred to her.

"Hold on, doesn't Powerglide have a history with, oh what's her name again, the sea foam green girl that came with Elita?"

"Moonracer?" Astoria supplied. At Carly's nod, the heiress shrugged. "Well, yeah, but it wasn't anything romantic. They were just old friends. I talked to her myself, she really is a sweetheart. After she got over the initial 'oh my heck' reaction, she wished us the best, and I think she really meant it."

"Elita's entire team is female, right?" Chip said thoughtfully. "You know, before I met them, I never thought the Transformers even HAD genders. I mean, why would giant alien robots need them, really?"

Everyone contemplated this for several seconds.

"You know, that's a pretty good point," Spike said first. "Back on Cybertron, they pretty much depended on a super computer called Vector Sigma to create more Transformers. That's where the Arielbots came from actually. So if they had that – and I'm talking from a strictly biological point here! – they wouldn't actually need female Transformers at all. They had Vector Sigma to do all the work."

"Whoa! Time!" Raoul made a 'T' with his hands. "You mean they're all asexual or something? That doesn't make any sense; if they were, guys like Blaster wouldn't love the ladies so much."

"I'm not saying they can't feel love or want to express intimacy," Spike clarified. "I'm just saying, the reason we have males and females is for reproduction, right? And it so happens that sex is also often used as a way to express deeper feelings, at least for us usually. But they don't actually need to reproduce because they've got Vector Sigma, so they don't need those, uh, that stuff. What they do instead might be so radically different we could never classify it as "sex". It'd be like comparing apples to moon rocks."

"Maybe, but I still find it hard to believe that Vector Something or whatever would be their ONLY source of new life," Raoul said. "If something happened to it, they'd be completely screwed. Not to mention, it'd be kind of hard for it to keep up with the population all by itself."

"It wouldn't have to," Spike retorted. "Actually, it'd be a great way to limit population growth to something Cybertron could have sustained, before the war I mean. These guys live for millions of years, it's not like they needed lots of babies to replace the old people dying."

"Seems logical, but too simplistic," Chip disagreed. "It doesn't explain why they're a dual gendered species in the first place if the usual function is moot, especially if they truly are asexual."

"Maybe it's not," Carly said, warming up. "You hear them sometimes say someone's acting like a 'sparkling,' right? It always sounded like they were talking about a baby. Vector Sigma makes them all grown up – naive and inexperienced, sure, but still adults – but they can still have kids of their own. It's probably just a whole lot harder."

"But they're _robots_," Spike stressed. "Intelligent, feeling, sentient robots, of course, but it's not like they have DNA or whatever. We can't project our own perceptions and experiences onto them and assume they're the same."

"No, but not everything might be as drastically different as you might think," Carly pointed out. "Besides, Ratchet once mentioned that Femmes have smaller but much brighter sparks than mechs do, and comparatively contain more energy contained in a smaller space. They wouldn't be that way without reason."

"Did he say what that reason was?" Chip asked. Carly shook his head.

"No, Sideswipe came in right then with Cliffjumper duck-taped to his kneecap. Ratchet was kind of distracted after that."

"Why the heck did Sideswipe have Cliffjumper attached to his kneecap?" Raoul asked incredulously. Carly shrugged in a 'how-should-I-know?' gesture.

"I didn't get to hear that part, I just tried to get out of the way before Ratchet started throwing stuff. Anyways, he didn't get a chance to finish that thought, but I've been thinking a lot about it. The only reason I can think of why femme sparks would be so different was for, um, 'sparking' I guess."

"'Sparking?'" Chip repeated with a raised brow.

"It's the only word I could think of, alright! But it makes sense of you think about it: smaller sparks to make room for more sparks, brighter sparks with more energy to spare for a new one. That would also mean they're not _actually_ asexual either."

"I guess I could buy that…" Spike said slowly, rubbing his chin. "And if the only substantial difference is in the spark itself, then that would explain the different body types, so everyone would be able to tell who had a girl spark or guy spark. So maybe they're not so asexual at all then."

"Maybe they actually are." Astoria suggested.

THAT got her some odd looks. Astoria spread her hands. "What? I'm just saying, we've talking about sex and genders like they're one and the same, and that the alternative is to be asexual, which pretty much implies no sex of any kind at all, not as we understand it anyway. Maybe they're not any of that. I mean, we define gender as being 'feminine' and 'masculine', but it's not a hard and fast rule to be tied with a person's physical sex. And if all you need is a pair of healthy sparks, well, maybe they don't even have sexes. Maybe they're not 'asexual', so much as 'genderless.'"

"I'm going to have to disagree with you there," Carly said politely. "If they didn't have dual genders, they wouldn't have bothered with different frames like they did."

"Not necessarily." Chip spoke as his eyes lit up. "Astoria got me thinking: maybe femmes and mechs aren't different genders, so much as they are different _models_."

"Okay, now I'm really confused," Raoul said, rubbing his temples. "So you're saying that all the 'bots are pretty much sexless too?"

"Well, I wouldn't go that far, but that's besides my point. I once asked Prowl if they were going to be having any trouble feeding so many new people coming all at once, and he mentioned that it wouldn't be so hard, femmes didn't need as much energon as mechs anyway. Turns out, femmes are designed for energy efficiency and material conservation: they need comparatively less energon to function and fewer raw materials to build, making them really practical in lean times. I bet if you looked at the history of popular models, the number of femmes would probably directly correlate with how prosperous Cybertron was at the time."

"That would explain why just about all the femmes are staying on Cybertron," Raoul said thoughtfully. "What with them not needing as much resources and Cybertron not having much left anyway."

"So we have, like, a femme minibot or jet, she's basically an energy-saving variation of Bumblebee or Silverbolt?" Astoria asked. Chip shrugged.

"Basically, I guess."

Spike frowned. "So if 'femme' just means 'energy efficient', aren't we back to all the Transformers basically being more or less asexual?"

"Dude, once again, I'm gonna have to say I don't wanna go that far," Raoul put in. "If the 'bots were honest to goodness asexual, then Blaster wouldn't like the ladies so much. I've seen him in the clubs, don't tell me he doesn't like the girls. And there's Powerglide, I think it's safe to say he likes girls too, even human ones."

"I'll vouch for that," Astoria said with a humorous smile. "Seriously though, I think we're going at this the wrong way."

She started counting off on her fingers. "One: to say they're _asexual_ is over-simplyfing it, since we have seen examples of otherwise. Even without Powerglide and Blaster, there's also Ironhide and Chromia and Optimus and Elita One. Two: it's quite possible that to Transformers, 'gender' means 'model', and 'femme' means 'energy efficient model'. Three: carrying that forward, there could be dozens of "genders" for all we know, but we just don't know how to look for them because we're used to looking for 'male' and 'female' cues. Ergo…"

Astoria clapped her hands together as if making a grand announcement.

"As we understand the terms, they're not 'sexless' or 'asexual', so much as essentially 'genderless.' They go by 'he' more by default than as an actual accurate description, and the femmes go by 'she' to differentiate themselves as being something drastically different. If all that's needed is a pair of healthy sparks, then what's to say that two mechs or two femmes can't have a sparkling together?"

Spike shot straight up in his seat looking like someone had just stuck his finger in an outlet.

"Whoa! Hold on a second! Don't you think that's going a little far now? I mean, not that there's anything wrong with anyone being gay or bi or whatever, but _everyone_?"

Astoria shook her finger at him like he was a naughty boy.

"Uh uh, you're thinking too simply again. If you're gay, you're attracted to the same sex. If you're bi, you're attracted to both sexes. If the Transformers are essentially sex_less_ or gender_less_, then being 'gay' or 'bi' completely loses its meaning."

All four humans stared at the young woman.

"If that was true, don't you think one of us would have noticed something by now?" Spike said at last in a suspiciously strained voice. "I mean, Carly and I, and my Dad, we've known these guys for years. Heck, we've been coming here for years, it's practically our second home. If there was any mech-on-mech stuff going on, someone would've noticed by now."

Astoria sniffed. "Clearly, you haven't been paying much attention to Jazz and Prowl."

Spike made a chocking sound.

Raoul rubbed a hand over his eyes. "I know I'm going to regret asking this, but where are you getting this? I've met those two, and they're not exactly making goo goo eyes at each other."

"Call it woman's intuition," Astoria said with a confidant smile. "You've gotta look for the small things, especially with guys like Prowl. Seriously, does anyone really think a guy as stiff as him would be comfortable with lots of PDA?"

Everyone conceded the point.

"You're probably reading too much into them though," Carly insisted. "Believe it or not, it IS entirely possible for two people, whatever their gender or lack thereof, to just be FRIENDS without being lovers."

"This is true," Astoria conceded. "But I still say there's more going on with those two, and they're just so compatible! Don't you think they'd make such a cute couple? And Inferno and Red Alert! They're just perfect for each other, aren't they?"

"I'm not hearing this…" Spike groaned, sounding like he was in physical pain. Carly patted him on the back.

"Wait a second, two minutes ago we were all talking about how some of the guys liked girls so much!" Raoul exclaimed in sudden realization. "And all the confirmed couples I've seen are all guy/girl pairing's, or whatever you wanna call them. How do you explain _that_?"

"That's right, all the _confirmed_ couples are all guy/girl." Astoria replied. "Maybe they think it's just safer and easier for them not to mention all the other ones."

"Why would they want to hide from us?" Chip asked naively.

Astoria gave him a flat look. "Our culture doesn't exactly have the greatest track record when it comes to accepting perceived homosexuality."

Chip cringed. So did Spike and Raoul.

"So you think Blaster might just've been faking then?" Raoul asked. Astoria shrugged.

"Well, I can't say that. For all I know, he just has a femme fetish." She said.

"…Come again?"

Astoria spread her hands. "The way I see it, for a mech to have a particular liking for femmes wouldn't be any different from a human guy having a particular liking for redheads. So, maybe guys like Blaster just have a femme fetish. It would be exactly the same if someone had, I don't know, a jet fetish or something. It's just a matter of preference."

"But what about the sparks?" Carly said. "Femme sparks ARE different from mech sparks, remember? Smaller and brighter? If a spark is a spark is a spark, they wouldn't be different without a darn good reason."

"It could be an effect of the frame design," Chip said. "Maybe since they're so energy efficient, excess energy gets absorbed by the spark. It's basically a ball of tightly compact pure energy anyway. If it was absorbing extra energy, of course it'd look brighter."

"That would imply that a sparks energy would fluctuate pretty dramatically with energy readings, especially when the Bot's drained," Carly retorted. "A spark would have to remain steady and stable for as much as possible for the 'bot to be healthy, like our own heartbeats."

"Yeah, but our heart rates DO fluctuate depending on the circumstances, and I haven't keeled over yet."

"What is this about heart rates and keeling?"

All humans startled and looked to see the new voice: a tall pink femme with an ornate helm coming in. Carly brightened.

"Hey, I remember you, I saw you once yesterday. You're Elita One, the Femme Commander, right?"

"That is correct," the new femme said with a smile, coming over to join them. "You must be Carly, Bumblebee has spoken much about you. Which one is Spike?"

Introductions followed, along with quick stories as to what they were doing there.

"A pleasure to meet you all." Elita said, nodding her head towards them graciously. "I feared I would spend all this time on Earth and never get a chance to meet a human properly."

"You must be happy, you look like you're practically glowing." Carly observes.

Elita grinned, leaning in a little and lowering her voice as if sharing a secret. "Well, as happy as I am to meet you all, I have another reason for being in such a good mood."

"Really? Did something happen?" Astoria asked, coming in a few steps.

Elita started to answer, but stopped and looked around, checking they were bereft of Autobot listeners.

Thoroughly curious now, all humans leaned in ready to hang off of every word.

"I shouldn't be telling you this," she whispered with a sly grin. "But I can't keep it in for much longer!"

"What, what, what!" Astoria whispered/squealed. "Tell us, you're killing me here!"

Elita came in a little lower with the biggest grin anyone has ever seen.

"Optimus and I have just seen Ratchet," she stared. "It's been confirmed: we're going to have a sparkling!"

Dead silence.

For two seconds.

"OMIGOSH! That's incredible!" Astoria squealed.

"That's so wonderful, I'm so happy!" Carly exclaimed, running up to Elita's leg and trying to hug her.

Elita happily accepted the shower of praise and congratulations, and if she noticed the triumphant look Carly gave her boyfriend, or the mild confusion among the boys ('so, who's point does this prove?'), she didn't mention it.

"So how come you're not supposed to tell us anyway?" Chip asked. "Heck, it if were me, I'd probably be yelling about it over the intercom by now."

"Optimus doesn't want a huge fuss right now," Elita explained. "He just wants to let a few close friends know before letting the base at large in on it."

Elita clapsed her hands together under her chin. "But I'm just so happy, I feel about ready to burst! I want so much to tell everyone!"

"I should have guessed something was up," Carly said wisely. "I mean, you're practically glowing, I should've guessed you were having a baby, I mean sparkling."

"Thank you Carly. Yes, I do feel like I'm glowing. I'm just so happy, I just can't keep it all to myself. I just want to stand on a mountain and tell the whole world about Optimus' pregnancy!"

* * *

The office door swished open to reveal a peeved off medic, not an uncommon (if unpleasant) sight. His Prime raised an optic ridge.

"Ratchet. Can I help you?"

For once, the CMO ignored his commander and zeroed in on the rose femme standing next to him.

"Elita, I just had the novel experience of having Tracks, Powerglide, Prowl, _and_ Bumblebee all come into my medbay with physically healthy but mentally traumatized patients. You wouldn't happen to know why I currently have five humans curled up in fetal positions rocking in a corner mumbling nonsense with four mechs hovering over them like panicked mother hens, would you?"

"I'm afraid I must claim ignorance in the matter," Elita said calmly. "Is this not normal? Why would you ask me?"

"You name was the only thing out of those humans anyone could understand!"

"Is that so? How fascinating. I did speak to them briefly, but I assure you I did nothing but talk to them for a minute or two."

Ratchet glared at her for a few seconds longer, before turning to leave muttering under his breath. Elita started to look back at the topographical maps of the surrounding desert, only to realize that her sparkmate was still looking at her.

"Is something wrong?" She asked innocently. Optimus wasn't buying it.

"Elita, what did you do?" he asked in a weary I-know-you-did-something-so-spill-already tone.

For a brief second, she considered telling Optimus about the conversation she just so happened to overhear, and the little joke she played to teach humans not to make such assumptions when all they had to do was ask. After all, it was quite rude to talk about other people's sex lives in their own home, so she was well within her rights to mess with their heads, just a little bit, right?

Instead, she smiled and pulled Optimus down for a kiss on the cheek.

"Why, nothing Optimus, nothing at all."

* * *

Just to clarify: no, no one is pregnant. Elita was just messing with the human's heads, because she could.

I know what some of you are wondering: which of these theories is the cannon for my universe? Well, my answer is: I'm nooot tellliiiiiing! :)


	5. Jealous

**Meme:** Jealous

**Universe:** Pre-movie. I might as well say it now: any time I write something in movie-verse, it'll also by extension be TPWIP (my first story) verse, mostly in lieu of fleshing out Elita's pre-earth history. No familiarity will be required, though I won't complain if you decide to go read that story too. ^_^

**Warnings:** Slight spoilers for TPWIP regarding Optimus's and Elita's relationship, but nothing major.

**Summary:** Elita has no regrets regarding her decision…or so she tries to tell herself.

* * *

_Time units: Vorn – 83 years_

_Orn – two weeks_

_Joor – six hours_

The episodes were generally few and far between, and Chromia was always far too disciplined to let them show when there were others present. Thankfully, they had never happened during an actual battle. There was no telling what would happen if they ever did, and Elita feared the worst. She also feared it was inevitable to happen.

But when they did happen, when she was in a middle of a sentence or menial task, she would stop and ghost her hand to her chassis, every time, the first warning sign mere seconds in advance. Whenever it happened, wherever they were, Elita was always quick to squirrel away her old friend someplace private where the others wouldn't see and normally unflappable and nigh unstoppable SiC curl up in a fetal position and whine with the spark deep pain, gripping Elita's hand so tightly she threatened to crush it completely off every time. Sometimes, the pain was so intense she would cry out and almost pass out.

Only Elita, and Elita alone, was allowed to witness these rare moments of weakness, to hold her hand no matter how much it hurt and speak to her in quite, soothing tones, for as long as the episode lasted, and for as long as it took for the bond to recover from the trauma and stabilize itself again.

Chromia's trembling started to cease, her fans slowing down, and the metal-bending grip on Elita's hand slowly loosening.

"He is alright?" Elita asked of the silvery-blue femme practically on her lap.

Chromia sat up, nodding. "Yeah, the fragger's still kicking. He's not about to die that easy."

Elita felt relief fill her, and Chromia leaned back against the wall as her systems stabilized themselves after the 'sympathy' pain.

Without warning, Chromia raised a fist and slammed it against the metal wall hard enough to leave a small dent and for Elita to feel the vibrations on the adjacent one. The red femme didn't even blink. This part almost always followed too.

"Primus frag it, what the slag is that Unicron spawn even doing? The last one was just a few orns ago, for Primus sake!" she growled murderously. "Can't he stay out of life-and-death situation for two joors at a time maybe? I swear to Primus, he makes me go through that one more time, I will personally him apart bolt by bolt – with a rusty screwdriver!"

"You have not exactly been keeping yourself entirely out of the range of fire either," Elita pointed out dryly. Chromia huffed.

"I'm not saying he should hide in a cave where the Decetpicons won't fine him. I just wish he'd think for half a second before throwing himself in the middle of a free for all like I know he's doing. He's not the only one who has to suffer for his idiotic heroics, you know!"

Elita's lips twitched in a girn as Chromia went on in her favorite rant about the 'trigger-happy kamikaze berserker idiot of a bondmate' of hers. She knew her friend too well to take her seriously: the posturing was just a way to cover up how scared she had been, and pretend she knew all along it would turn out alright.

The amusement, and smile, faded.

Every time Chromia had one of these attacks, it was because Ironhide had been badly, almost fatally, wounded. Every time Chromia had taken a hit that threatened to take her off-line, they both knew Ironhide was suffering as well. And when the pain passed, no matter how agonizing it was, they both knew the other was alive, and would soon be well. Because that was what it meant to be bondmates: it was to let another being into your spark, to be connected, and know beyond a shadow of a doubt when they were alright…and when they weren't.

Elita's hand trailed up to her chest, just over her single, isolated spark.

Whenever Optmius was hurt, and he must have been at least once no matter how determined Ironhide was to jump in front if every bullet, she herself had felt absolutely nothing. When she was injured, fighting for her life while the medics struggled to bring her back, Optimus would have felt absolutely nothing.

If Optimus were off-lined, would she feel anything? Was their long, if unconsummated, relationship enough for her to have a feeling, a flicker, a sensation that would tell her Optimus was gone? Or would she remain unaffected, ignorant and oblivious until they heard of it from somone else? And if so, how many vorns would it take before she knew, believing and hoping he lived while all the while he was already gone?

Elita's fingers trembled, and for an instant the overwhelming anxiety made her want to purge her tanks.

She fisted the traitorous hand and laid it in her lap.

She didn't regret her decision. It had killed her to say no, to see the hurt and disappointment in Optimus' optics, but it was the only way. If she were to be hurt, and enough of her pain transferred to cripple Optimus, as it did for Chromia, he would be left vulnerable, easy prey. If it happened on the battlefield, he would be completely defenseless, at the mercy of the Decepticons if his team couldn't get to him in time. And if she died…

If was horrible, the agony of not knowing, but if that was the price she had to pay so that the Autobots would not lose their Prime because of her, so be it. She would pay it gladly. The Autobots needed him so much more anyway.

But other times, when Chromia was complaining about Ironhide to cover up her fear, when she saw the spark-deep emotion of relief and joy that would flicker across her face when she realized her bond was still there, even when she was in agony for their shared pain…in those times, it was so hard to fight back the wave of bitter envy that her dear friend was allowed the assurance and closeness she herself was denied. It was so hard not to be angry that Chromia could afford that luxury, and Elita who had to shoulder so much more, could not.

It was so, so hard…

"Eltia?"

The femme snapped back to reality, to see Chromia looking at her in concern, her hands still up in her latest illustration of what she was going to do to Ironhide the next time she saw him.

Elita smiled apologetically. "My apologies, I fear I have not been listening. Perhaps I have not been recharging long enough."

Chromia wasn't fooled, and she reached over to place a hand on Elita's shoulder. "Elita, you know full well as I do that if Ironhide's still kicking, then Optimus is too. No way Ironhide would ever let Optimus die before he did."

Elita was mildly startled, but shook her head in resignation. "It would seem I am becoming too easy to read."

"Naw, I've just known you for vorns." Chromia disagreed with a smile. But she sobered. "Look, I know this has been tough on you too. Heck, much as these 'episodes' completely suck slag, it's probably been even tougher on you. Just don't let yourself try to carry all that baggage, alone, alright? You know I'm here for you too."

Elita smile morphed into one of sincere gratitude, and she placed her own hand on Chromia's. She gave it a squeeze.

"I sincerely appreciate that, my friend."

Eltia stood and offered Chromia a hand up.

"Come, we had best vacate this closet and return before our presence is too widely missed."

Perhaps someday, she and Optimus would be able to entre that sacred bond at last. That hope was one of the things that kept Elita going, that happy hope at the end of a long, dark tunnel.

And if at night, she was kept awake by the paralyzing fear that it was already too late…well, those nights, she kept those to herself.


	6. Playing With Kids

**Meme:** Playing With Kids

**Universe:** Pre-move, by extension TPWIP-verse.

**Warnings:** None.

**Summary:** The world is slowly crumbling, and Elita's just trying to keep the pieces together for as long as she can for those who need it most.

Guest starring **Sparklight** of Misao-CG. Mentions of **Sneakthief** of Fields of Heather. Nebula is mine. Don't judge her too harshly, she's honestly trying to do what she thinks is best for her daughter.

Click – 1 minute

Joor – 1 hour

Orn – 1 day

Vorn – 1 year

* * *

"ELITA!"

The femme cringed at the familiar voice as her home office door swished open, allowing in a familiar and enraged yellow and green femme. She stomped to Elita's desk and stood in front of her, with her hands on her hips, radiating rage. Elita put down the data pad with her finance information and gave her a tired look.

"Yes Nebula?"

"What gives you the right to go over my head and give my daughter FIGHTING lessons?" Nebula demanded. "What, are you trying to groom the younglings into becoming soldiers? I thought you were trying to _protect_ us from the war, not become a boot camp for the little ones!"

Elita off-lined her optics briefly as she felt a processor ache coming on. "That is not my intent, Nebula. The fighting classes are strictly optional. All the volunteers have taken them, including myself, and they're open to anyone who comes through here. Your daughter decided she wanted to learn, and Chromia accepted her."

"Without consulting me, her creator!"

"Nebula, your daughter may be young, but she is still a legal adult," Elita reminded her. "I have no legal obligation to keep her from Chromia even if I wanted to. Nor do you have any right to stop her."

"No right…she's my daughter! She's supposed to become a medic, not a soldier! She's supposed to help save lives, not take them!" Nebula jabbed a finger at Elita. "I won't let you twist her into a sparkless killer! Either you take her out of those classes, or we're leaving!"

Elita steepled her fingers and leaned her elbows on her desk. "I cannot very well force you to stay." She said. "If you have family or friends to whom you can go to and find safety, you are free to do so. I encourage you even. It will free space and resources for those who truly have no other recourse. But I will not force Sneakthief into doing anything. The fighting classes are strictly voluntary. I have no right to force her choice. Nor do I have any intention of 'twisting' her into anything. I pray to Primus that she DOES become a medic, but in these times none of us can afford to not be ready for anything. I will do my utmost to keep you and your daughter away from the war, and Chromia will do her utmost to prepare anyone willing to be ready in case it should catch them anyway."

Nebula glared at her, nearly vibrating with anger, looking about ready to strike the seated femme across the desk. After a painfully long silence, she turned on her heel and strode out of the office with loud, angry steps.

Elita cycled a breath of air and held her face in her hands.

Ever since the war, it had been steadily growing bigger and bigger and more and more mechs threw their support to either side, more lines being drawn, more cities being pulled in, and more cities being swallowed up by the fighting, either being occupied or destroyed. Elita sincerely hoped the war wouldn't get much bigger than this – it had caused too much destruction and torn their society too much apart as it was. She just had to trust Optimus to stop his brother before his blind ambition consumed the planet in violence and destruction.

Until then, Elita was going to be helping in her own way – by helping the refugees from destroyed cities move to other neutral cities, especially the slighter-built and difficult to upgrade femmes, and younglings. Megatron didn't seem as concerned with recruiting femmes to his cause as he was with huge mechs with enough fire power to level a building by themselves, to by and large her efforts manage to stay beneath the radar. Thank Primus for small mercies.

But after almost eight vorns, her resources were getting stretched thin. From between her fingers Elita stared down at the data pad she had been looking at before Nebula had barged in, the one with her finance data on it.

She had been relying on donations early on, but it was getting harder and harder to find funding to keep her organization going, no matter what cuts she made, up to and including using her own home as a safe house and base of operations (hence why she was in her 'home' office). She'd been dipping into her own savings just to provide everyone with the basic necessities. Although she wasn't proud of it, she had already been forced to blackmail two senators into giving hefty donations just too keep them afloat for a little while longer, and she was running out of avenues.

Worse, as more and more cities became embroiled in the war, there were more and more refugees and neutrals with no place to go. For every one femme or youngling she helped, there were at least a dozen more she couldn't. Having to turn all those lost ones away for sheer lack of space or supplies, it tore her apart on the inside. She lost many a night of recharge, remembering their faces, knowing they had nowhere to go and no one to turn to.

It was just all…so…crushing.

She laid her arms on her desk and buried her face in them, suddenly feeling incredibly overwhelmed and helpless. How much longer could she keep this up? How much longer was the war going to last? How many more innocents were going to be hurt, and how many more was she going to have to abandon for the sake of the ones she already had? How, how, how…

Something small lightly bumped against her ankle.

Elita's head shot up, startled by the sudden and random sensation by her foot. She pushed her chair back and looked down at the affected appendage, to find a bright gold ball sitting innocently under her desk.

She looked up at the door, to find a little teal femme youngling, sparkling really, standing half behind the still open door. She couldn't have been more that two or three vorns old, and she was looking at Elita intently with the one optic she could see, seemingly nervous about entering the office. As well she should be; when she opened her Towers home as a safe house, she had been quite explicit as to where the 'guests' could and couldn't go, her office being a special point.

After a few seconds of dallying, the little youngling refocused from Elita to the ball. Now intently focused on her treasure, she trotted right into the office and fearlessly crawled under her desk, grabbing the ball. As Elita watched, the little femme promptly sat down, made herself comfortable, and bounced the ball off the walls of the desk.

Elita smiled at the cheeky little femme.

She slid out of her chair to her knees, right next to the teal youngling. The little one paid her no attention, still bouncing her ball, until Elita caught it on the rebound. She smiled at the youngling's wide optics.

"Can I play?" She asked.

Elita and the youngling bounced the ball between themselves, the walls, the floor, even the ceiling once when Elita threw it down too hard. She tossed it up, rolled it over and under her hands, even up her arm a couple of times, every trick she could think of to entertain the youngling. The little femme smiled and laughed and clapped her hands for more, and Elita felt the stress and anxiety just melt away.

"Moonracer!"

Elita missed the ball and got bonked in the forehead, with just delighted the little one to no end.

The speaker turned out to be one of the volunteers, a youngish black and blue femme with white highlights named Sparklight. She gasped and covered her hands over her mouth, her doorwings twitching in mortification. "Elita One! I'm so sorry, I didn't mean, that is, I was just looking for Moonracer!" She pointed wildly at the little femme, her optics darkening in embarrassment.

Elita rubbed her forehead and waved off the apology with her other hand. Sparklight was usually a calm, sweet femme, but for some reason every time she talked directly to Elita she seemed to be almost perpetually shy or embarrassed.

"Think nothing of it," she said. "It is not as if I actually injured myself." She tickled the little one in the stomach, prompting more giggles. "So your name is Moonracer then? A fitting name I suspect, if you managed to get away from Sparklight of all bots."

Sparklight lowered her hands and shyly smiled, more comfortable with the more familiar topic. "That she has. Fastest little sparkling I've ever had to watch, and I work at the Youth Sector!"

The social worker and nanny of the day came all the way in, bent down to pick the youngling up. "Come here you little sneak you, all your new friends are waiting for you in the play room. Doesn't that sound fun?"

"NO!"

Both femmes jumped at Moonracers (very) loud declaration. The teal youngling got up and hurried around Elita's other side, gripping her arm and glaring defiantly at Sparklight. The femme came in a little closer.

"Moonracer, sweetie, I know you liked playing with Elita, but she needs to get back to work now, and you need to let her. You want to be a good femme, don't you?"

"No!" Moonracer repeated empathetically. Elita couldn't help but snort.

"She seems quite reluctant to leave," she mentioned dryly. She gathered the femme in her arms and stood. She held the femme so she could speak to her face to face.

"My apologies little one, but Sparklight is correct: I have much work to do, and if you stay I will never get anything done. Now be a good youngling and go with Sparklight, I will see you again later."

Sparklight came over and pried the youngling off of Elita. With a quick apology and promise to not let Moonracer get away from her again, she left the office, Moonracer peering over her shoulder back at Elita.

Elita watched her go, feeling a little sad that 'play time' was over. But, she had told the truth; she still had a lot of work to do, even if a part of her wanted to curl up and die at the thought of poring over the numbers for the tenth time.

She moved around the desk for her chair, but felt her foot hit something. She stopped in mid step and looked down. It was Moonracers bright gold ball. It must have rolled by the desk when Elita failed to catch it, and the youngling had forgotten it.

Elita bent down and picked up the ball, placing it carefully on her desk with a mental note to return it to Moonracer later. She seemed attached to it, and if she was anything like the other younglings, she probably didn't have many other toys left to her. When you were running from a war, you couldn't afford to take much with you beyond the necessities, and toys were not on the list.

Elita eased back into her chair and picked up the data pad again. Just looking at the numbers was already making her head swim again, and she shut off her optics before the swimming sensation could turn into a full-blown processor ache. Primus, she needed a break.

She on-lined her optics and glanced at the ball. Then to the data pad. Then back to the ball.

Well, she needed to return it anyway…

oOoOoOoOoOo

Sparklight dropped Moonracer back behind the gate keeping the youngest in the room, currently occupied by five younglings from two to four vorns old. Moonracer, her previous ire forgotten, hurried over to play with her new friends. Their current caretaker watched them with a smile. Between her work at the Youth Sector and volunteering for Elita's organization to help refugees, almost all of her time was getting eaten up. But at simple times like this, she was glad she decided to donate her time to help. These little ones did not deserve to grow up in a battle zone.

"You look happy."

Sparklight half turned, and then did a double take as she comprehended the speaker, her doorwings flaring up in reflection of her surprise.

"Elita! Is something the matter?"

The red femme shook her head. "No, nothing is the matter, I just came to return something."

She held up a gold ball, one that Sparklight remembered being Moonracers favorite toy. So THAT'S where it had gone!

Elita moved past Sparklight and stepped over the gate, gaining the attention of the little ones. Moonracer squealed in delight and ran up to her legs, hugging her knees. Elita laughed and petted her head.

"I am glad to see you too, Moonracer," she said warmly. She bent down and offered the ball, which Moonracer took back with great delight. By now several of the other younglings were wandering over, wondering what was going on or perhaps hoping for a game. Elita knelt down among them, surrounded by little bodies.

"A pleasure to meet you all," she said with a warm smile. "Do you like stories?"

A chorus of cheers and "yays!" which summoned the other younglings. Elita sat on her knees and drew Moonracer on her lap.

"Well then, I fear I do not know many stories, so you will have to help me, alright? Now then, this story is about a little mech and a little femme, co-creations and just about your age. Do they live in the Towers, in a little house, or on another planet?"

The younglings called out their choices, and Elita listened and went with the most popular choice (another planet), and went from there, making up a story about two younglings who stray from home and need to find their way back, stopping occasionally to ask the younglings what happened next.

Sparklight crossed clasped her hands under her chin at the adorable sight of Elita practically glowing with all the enraptured younglings around her. Quietly as she could, she backed away and left them to themselves. She'd be back in a little bit to relieve Elita, but for now, it was good for the older femme to reconnect what she was fighting so hard to protect.

* * *

Special thanks to Misao-CG and Fields of Heather for lending their characters. They are just made of awesome.

Reviews are love. ^_^


	7. Naughty

Crimson Starlight poked me. I had no choice but to update.

**Meme:** Naughty

**Universe:** G1

**Warnings:** May or may not take place before "Bathtime." I haven't really decided yet.

**Summary: **While Sideswipe is mostly indiscriminate about whom he pranks, he's always had two exceptions: Optimus Prime, and Ratchet the Hatchet. This is the story of the third...maybe.

**Guest Apperances**: Flameshield's OC "Aqua".

* * *

"Hey Sunstreaker, you think Prowls been especially tense lately?"

Sunstreaker gave his brother on the berth a sidelong glance from the couch, where he was trying (key word: trying) to get through a book file.

"Sideswipe, if this is your way of asking for my help for a prank of stupid proportions, forget it."

"Sunstreaker, I'm hurt, really hurt, that I can't express honest concern for a fellow Autobot's welfare without you assuming that I'm setting up for a prank!"

"Aren't you?"

"Well, yes, but that's beside's the point! My point is, Prowl's been on edge lately, right? (Or as on edge as someone that stiff could possibly get anyway), And it's gotten really bad since Jazz left for Peru a few days ago, remember?"

"And your point?" Sunstreaker asked archly.

"Well, I'm saying Prowl needs to de-stress before he sends himself to the med bay, and since I'm such a caring mech, I'm going to help him out!"

"In what alternate universe does 'pranking' fall under 'stress relief?'" Sunstreaker asked dryly. "You're pranks are what's sending him to an early grave as it is."

Sideswipe waved off the argument. "Yeah, but this'll be different: it'll be private, so he won't be embarrassed in front of everyone else, and it'll just break the tension so that he'll have to relax. Teach him to laugh at himself even!"

"Sideswipe, the most likely outcome of that is you painting a sign on your back saying 'Hit Me, Please.'" Sunstreaker turned thoughtful. "Then again, beating you up always makes me relaxed, so maybe it'll work for Prowl too if you can torque him off enough."

"Gee, thanks Sunny, I really feel the love." Sideswipe was practically standing in a puddle of all the sarcasm he was dripping. But he brightened and turned hopeful. "So does this mean you're going to help?"

"Slag no. Unlike you, I have all my mental facilities working, and I'm NOT going to go to Prowl begging for three months of inventory duty just for giggles."

"You're no fun!"

oOoOoOoOoOo

Sideswipe didn't actually _need_his brother's help, but it was always more fun with a co-conspirator when pranking, with the bonus of having a partner to help with the inventory after the slag hit the fan. Oh well, he'd just have to try and avoid getting caught and/or leaving any evidence it was him. He may be the most notorious prankster on the Ark, but Prowl would never punish him without evidence.

The tactician was just so lovable like that.

The prank itself was simple: he knew that Prowl was expecting a delivery today, to be taken directly to his office rather than be picked up (because the mech couldn't be bothered to leave his office for ten minutes, the workaholic freak), so all he had to do was convince Red Alert to let him be the one to take it ("Oh come one, what'd you think I'm going to do, stick a super sized pie catapult in the box? I mean, I'm good, but I'm not THAT good."), then switch out Prowl's box with his own when the hall was empty and he was in a rare camera blind spot (and of course, he knew where they all were by now). When Prowl picked the fake package up, he'd be getting a "unique" surprise.

Not very elaborate or elegant, but he was going for silly and harmless, not creative and epic. Besides, the look on Prowl's face would be _priceless_!

Sideswipe oh-so-carefully put the box down just to the side of Prowl's office door, knocked twice to let him know, and hurried down the hall to hide behind the corner. He just HAD to stick around just look enough to see Prowl's expression!

A few seconds later he heard the sound of the door swish open. A momentary pause as the monochromic Datsun looked around and spotted the box, shuffling as he turned and bent over, box being lifted, click of the trap, and SPLAT!

Sideswipe had to stuff his fist in his mouth to keep himself from laughing and giving himself away. That would have been counterproductive to the whole hiding-out-first thing.

Still shaking with restrained giggles, Sideswipe peeked around the corner to get a look at the gob-smacked face he KNEW would be gracing the stoic tactitians face plates right then. But the second he did, all mirth was sucked away in place of blank disbelief.

Sideswipe came to the unfortunate realization right then and there that he probably should have checked Prowl's scheduale more carefully. If he had, he might've known that the reason Prowl couldn't leave his office was because he was having a meeting with Elita One.

The poor femme had picked up the box in Prowls place, just trying to be polite and bring it in for him, and was rewarded with green goop covering almost her entire upper body, dripping off her frame in thick gobs every few seconds. The only clean part of her were her optics, glowing bright blue in sharp contrast to the green, blinking slowly in stupefied fashion as if she was having trouble computing what had just happened. Prowl was standing in the open doorway, having rushed over as soon as he heard the wet sound of goop on metal, one hand on the frame as he leaned out, his optics wide and mouth opened slightly in faint horror as he stared at the unintended victim, stock still except for the tell tale twitching of his doorwings that spoke of rising apocalyptic fury.

Sideswipe transformed into his much faster alt. mode and quietly ran for his life.

oOoOoOoOoOo

"You pranked Elita?"

"Almost thirty 'bots in the entire base, and of all the 'bots to walk into the prank, it had to be her!" Sideswipe groaned. "Prowl is going to kill me, then Ratchet's gonna fix me up so Prime can kill me all over again. They're gonna be killing me over and over again until there's not enough left of me to retrofit into a scooter! You've got to help me Sunstreaker, I'm too young to die!"

"You seemed to have mistaken me for someone who cares," Sunstreaker said flatly.

"You're a horrible brother! How can you betray me like this! Don't you care if Optimus turns me inside out and Prowl turns what's left into a piñata for the minibots?!"

Sunstreaker growled and rubbed his optics in irritation with his free hand.

"Sideswipe, it's been hours since then. No one has said anything to me, not about Prowl, not about Prime, and certainly not about your 'inspired' idea to de-stress our resident El Pricko. If anyone was going to be doing anything, they'd have done it by now."

"Maybe Prowl's trying to play some kind of sick mind game, let me stew for a few days before he pounces after I've fallen into a false sense of security!" Sideswipe shot back and now sounding slightly hysterical. "That's just the sort of thing he'd do!"

"Is it really?"

Sideswipe actually had to stop and think about that one.

"Well…he _has_ always been pretty prompt before, come to think of it…" he admitted slowly.

"Exactly. Obviously, someone decided it wasn't worth the trouble and it'd just be easier to just let this blow over. And I know this is really hard for you, but so long as you keep your inherent stupidity instinct under control for the near future, you might get lucky and not spend the next year cleaning out the wash racks with a human-sized toothbrush again."

"Thank you oh brother of mine, you really know how to comfort a guy," Sideswipe said flatly.

Still, Sideswipe mused and he continued down the orange hall again with Sunstreaker behind him, his brother had a point. He had been waiting on pins and needles for the proverbial axe to fall, but nothing had happened at all. He knew that Prowl wouldn't take it so easy, but perhaps Optimus had enough of a sense of humor to stop his SiC from sending the frontline warrior to a premature grave. After all, it HAD truly been a harmless prank, and all it would have taken was a quick trip to the wash racks to clean up. And maybe a mop for the floor.

Sideswipe nodded to himself as he punched in the code to open the door to the quarters he and Sunstreaker shared and waited for the doors to swish open. Really, he had been overreacting, pulling a Red Alert (and there's a scary thought). No one was after him, and no one was lying in wait to pounce on him. There was nothing, truly nothing, to worry about.

"Hello Sideswipe."

**"AAAAIIIIIIEEEEEEE!"**

The surprise guest reared back slightly at the audio onslaught, optics wide in surprise. "I must say, I have never been greeted in such a fashion. Is it an earth custom you have picked up? I've heard you're rather fond of those."

Sideswipe gaped at the pink femme sitting delicately on the arm of the twins couch, facing the door as if she had been politely waiting for them…which she probably had been.

"You…why…how…I locked the door!" Sideswipe sputtered. He spun toward his brother. "Did you let her in!?"

Sunstreaker looked vaguely affronted, crossing his arms. "I know about as much as you do. Just what ARE you doing in OUR quarters, Elita?"

"Waiting." She said simply with a cheeky smile. "You had been in hiding for hours, I had to be sure I would be able to bump into you eventually."

It finally occurred to Sideswipe that maybe he shouldn't have been quite so worried about Prowl or Prime as he should of the Guerilla Warfare Commander.

Her smile widened as she stood up. She looked past the red twin to the golden one. "Sunstreaker, would you mind terribly if I spoke with your brother in private for a few minutes?"

Sideswipe shot Sunstreaker his best _don't-leave-me-I-don't-want-to-die!_ look.

Sunstreaker clapped a hand on Sideswipes shoulder, and with utmost gravity said "Well, it was nice knowing you."

And with that parting message, Sunstreaker shoved the sacrificial lamb into the room and locked the door behind him.

Sideswipe faced Elita and put on the biggest who-me-I'm-innocent smile he had (and let it be said that Sideswipe had the most versatile facial expression of any bot – except maybe Smokescreen).

"So Elita, is this business or pleasure?"

"Let's cut to the chase, I have a meeting in ten minutes, and I don't have time for beating around the bush," Elita said, getting up off the couch arm.

Sideswipes smile never wavered. "Really? Well, it's a shame you don't have time to talk, and after waiting so long for me! Perhaps next time-"

"Sideswipe, everyone knows perfectly well that you were the one who switched the packages, and the only reason you're not in the brig for insubordination or on PR duties at various kindergarten classes for the next two years for embarrassing Prowl or just plain torquing Optimus off is because I convinced them both not to take any action until after I spoke with you myself."

Sideswipes normally quick mental processes came to a screeching halt, and his smile dropped to give Elita the blankest stare that had ever graved his face. "What?"

Elita waggled a finger at him mockingly. "You were quite careful to avoid the cameras on the way to Prowl's office, but not so much when you fled the scene."

_Dang it!_

"I…I…" Sideswipe gave up and let his shoulders sag. "So what processor killing, mind dulling yet surprisingly creative and cruel punishment have YOU come up with?"

"Nothing."

For the second time in less than a minute, his processors came to a halt. He really wished that would stop happening, it made coming up with witty responses hard.

"Eh?"

Very hard.

Elita tilted her head to the side as she examined Sideswipe, looking mildly amused. "From what I understand, your pranks are infamous for creativity and breadth, in that if they do not entrap many victims, they can at least be appreciated by nearly all the crew before being dismantled and victims released. So this latest one was a bit outside the norm, in that if it had worked properly no one but Prowl and yourself, and perhaps Red Alert, would have known. I admit to curiosity as to why the M.O. change."

Sideswipe rubbed the back of his neck, figured what the heck, and with an 'eat the poison, eat the plate' attitude, went ahead and told her. "Well, you've probably noticed that Prowl's been extra uptight lately, especially since Jazz isn't here to make sure he stops working for more than two minutes at a time…"

Elita let Sideswipe explain himself, nodding along and letting him finish his story, looking intrigued. Sideswipe took this as a good sign that he might be able to get through this fiasco with all his pieces and paint after all.

"So yeah, you getting it instead? Total accident. If I knew it was you, I'd have done something more special." He joked as he wrapped up his defense.

Elita chuckled in good natured humor. "Well then, that answers my questions. After hearing your side of the story, I have decided that no official action will be taken against you. I will speak to Prowl and Optimus again and make sure it is so."

Sideswipe could almost hear the chorus sing 'Haaaallelujah!' Sunstreaker had been right after all! Of course Elita wasn't going to rain fire and brimstone on him for something so harmless as a little green goo, she must have a better sense of humor than Prowl, though really that wasn't saying –

Wait.

"No _official_ punishment?" Sideswipe repeated, feeling his spark sink in dread. "What about _un_official?"

Elita only answered with a cryptic smile and walked right past him out the door, leaving Sunstreaker to deal with the now freaked out Sideswipe.

oOoOoOoOoOo

"Um, Sideswipe, what are you doing?"

The aforementioned 'bot just about jumped out of his plating with a high pitched girly squeal at the voice behind him, and managed to spin around in mid air to face the one who managed to sneak up on the high-strung Lamborghini, arms already up defensively and ready to leap or run for his life as the situation presented itself.

Bluestreak blinked. "Wow. That was actually pretty cool. I don't I've ever seen you jump quite that high straight up before."

Sideswipe slumped at his fight-or-fight protocols calmed down in the absence of real 'danger.' "Blue, please, for the love of mercy, don't do that to me!"

"Sorry Sides," Blue said shyly. He walked past Sideswipe and made a beckoning motion. "I'm heading to the rec room for some energon. Walk with me?"

Sideswipe took up up on the offer with great enthusiasm. Elita wouldn't do anything to him while he was with an innocent bystander, right? Right??

"So, why're you so jumpy today anyway?" Bluestreak asked, locking his hands behind his back as he walked along side the taller warrior. "I mean, I don't think I've ever seen you like this, not even when Prowl was on the hunt after one of your pranks. Wait, did you do a prank? No, wait, I haven't heard anything about that, so I guess you haven't, otherwise everyone would be talking about it by now. Actually, Prowl has been kind of tense lately, and he seemed really annoyed about something earlier, but I didn't ask him why because I didn't want to pry and Jazz is really the only bot he'll open up to, except maybe Optimus though he's the Prime and it'd be kind of weird to confide in him I guess. So anyway, what're you so jumpy about?"

Sideswipe gave the loquacious little gunner a long look. Bluestreak must have really wanted to know if he was able to circle right back to his original question. He debated telling him for a moment, but figured, well, maybe he'd be able to get at least one ally since Sunstreaker had seen fit to leave him high and dry - while pointing and laughing, he might add!

_Several minutes and one confessional/explanation later…_

"You pranked Elita?"

"I'm not having this conversation again." Sideswipe groaned, slapping his hand over his eyes. Bluestreak giggled.

"Well, if it makes you feel any better, I don't think Elita's going to have any time today today to do anything really. I mean, it's not that she's not doing ANYTHING, it's more like she's doing to much to do anything else. I heard most of the command staff, her included, is going to be tied up with meetings and work for the next...day and a half or so. Plus, I'm pretty sure I heard Ratchet mention that she's going to DC with Optimus to meet the President for something, I don't know if it's a real meeting or something symbolic, humans really like stuff like that. Anyway, she's going to be really busy with lots of important stuff, so I don't think she's going to be able to do much of anything really for the rest of the time she's here. I guess that's bad because it means everyone's working hard and the officers are barely going to have any free time, but at least it means she'll be too busy to do anything to you herself."

Sideswipe looked at Bluestreak carefully. "So, she's **completely** occupied?"

The grey datsun stepped aside to let Firestar leave the rec room. "Well, it sounds to me like Elita's got a awful lot to do and not a whole lot of time to do it. I don't think she's the type to put something off or rush it so she'll have time to, I don't know, trip you down the hall or something. Maybe she just wanted you to _believe_ she was up to something so you'd spend the next week and a half waiting for the axe to fall. That's what you were doing already anyways, so I guess it was working."

"So…you think I'm safe?"

"Well, from Elita at least."

"Oh thank primus!" Sideswipe exclaimed, feeling all the tension leaving his frame. "Now that would have been cruel and unusual punishment."

Bluestreak giggled again. "Well, you did splatter her with green goo, so you can't say you weren't asking for it." he pointed out as he filled his own cube. "You're lucky she didn't get madder. At least she's not the petty, vengeful sort."

"That'd be scary," Sideswipe agreed as he pressed the dispenser button.

Nothing happened.

Confused, Sideswipe pressed the button again.

"Weird," he commented, leaning down to look at it better. "Is it jammed or something?"

The second his optic was level with the dispenser (and too close to get away), the nozzle shot a thick stream of blue liquid straight into Sideswipes face.

With a shocked cry Sideswipe stood up, except the stream was still shooting out with the speed and force of a fire-hose, dousing him completely in the blue stuff even as he tried to backpedal away. Insult was added to injury when he slipped on the puddle pooling at his feet to land flat on his back. Only then did the dispenser abruptly shut off.

Dead silence for a few seconds, then the entire rec room exploded in laughter. Even Bluestreak, who was trying so hard to contain himself for the sake of his friend, was wildly twitching his doorwings and grinning widely behindh his hands.

"Primus, you can't PAY for entertainment this good!" Ironhide guffawed, slapping the tabletop with one hand. Sideswipe scowled at the room in general.

"Laugh it up you," he muttered darkly, flicking the sticky blue liquid off his face. "Just what IS this stuff anyway??"

Bluestreak kneeled down and touched two fingers to the puddle, then lifted them to his olfactory sensor. "Well, it feels pretty cold, and smells sharp and funny, so it might be the stuff for the self-cleaning mechanism in the dispenser. Actually, I think that's what it is. We should probably tell Wheeljack or somebody that it's broken."

Bumblebee came over and looked at the dispensor itself curiously. Experimentally, he picked up an empty cube, stepped out of the way, waited a few seconds for Sideswipe to scramble out of the line of fire, and hit the 'dispense' button.

Bright pink energon obediantly poured out in a steady stream until the cube was filled, shutting off automatically.

"Working fine now," he pointed out unnecessarially.

Sideswipe stared incredulously.

"...What the PIT??"

oOoOoOoOoOo

Sideswipe was no Sunstreaker or Tracks, but nobody would be able to just sit down to a meal while dripping in cleansing solution he had nearly drowned in, especially when it was drying into a sticky mess that left blue splotches all over him. He just hurried down the hallway as fast as he could with dignity, hoping not to bump into too many others on the way and get through today with at least a scrap of his dignity intact.

He turned the last corner and nearly barreled right over Arcee. So much for that.

"Sideswipe? What happened to YOU?" She asked incredulously.

The warrior ignored her, brushing right past her and making a beeline for the (thankfully) empty washracks and went to his usual spot. He twisted the spigot on and off-lined his optics as warm water cascaded down to rinse away the drying energon.

Except, the water felt kind of weird, thicker, almost like –

Sideswipe optics flashed on.

Instead of nice hot clean water, Sideswipe was getting doused in apple-green paint.

"AAAARRGH!"

oOoOoOoOoOo

It took nearly an hour to scrub off every scratch of green paint and dried on energon with the strongest solvents they had, and he had to duck out and drag in a blushing Bluestreak, who had come after him to make sure he was alright, to make sure he got all the stuff off his back. But he was finally able to emerge from the wash racks clean again.

"Feel better?" Bluestreak asked, calming down again now that he wasn't being made to scrub Sideswipes back. The red mech stretched out his arms and examined himself.

"A little bit," he admitted.

"You're looking better," a higher pitched, amused voice said. Sideswipe and Blutstreak turned to see a blue/teal/green femme with yellow optics standing there with a hand on her hip and a little smirk on her face. Sideswipe frowned, not remembering her name.

"You're Aqua, right?" Bluestreak, always the personable one, asked with a friendly smile.

At her nod, Sideswipe added "I take you saw what happened in the rec room?"

"Not personally, but just about everyone's heard about it my now." Aqua answered. "Last I heard, Cliffjumper was bugging Red Alert for a copy of the footage."

"Joy," Sideswipe grumbled. Bluestreak giggled as his disgruntled expression.

"Sorry I can't stay, but I've got monitor duty with Sunstreaker, so I've got to get going." With a little wave to Sideswipe and Aqua, Bluestreak hurried away down the corridor. Aqua tilted her head in thought, then checked the data pad she had been carrying.

"Come to think of it, I'm surprised you were able to get out of your shift so quickly actually. From what I understand, Prowl's not usually so lenient."

Sideswipe gave her a blank look. "What shift?"

Aqua snapped her head up in surprised. "You don't know? The duty roster was adjusted last night because Bumblebee had been putting off his checkup and Ratchet got tired of waiting. Say's here you're taking his place on the PR trip to St. Helena's Primary School today. Apparently, you're meeting with the kindergarten classes about road safety."

"….Are you slagging KIDDING me??"

Aqua held up the data pad in front of her as proof. "If you really didn't get your shift covered, then you've got ten minutes to get down to the school before Prowl owns your aft."

"AAARRGH!" Sideswipe screamed, just before transforming and tearing down the hallway, leaving skid marks in his wake, never noticing Aqua's little grin.

oOoOoOoOoOo

Five hours later and Sideswipe was dragging his pedes back to his quarters and wishing the day would hurry up and _end_ already, because if one more thing happened, so help him he would not be held accountable for what he did next.

"Oh my, Sideswipe, you look exhausted. Has the day been stressing for you?"

Sideswipe stopped dead in his tracks. On top of everything else, Pure Pink Evil had arrived.

Elita One just smiled genially at him as he slowly turned his head to look at her. "Well, I do hope your trip to the school lifted your spirits a bit. It sounded like it would have been fun, I'm sorry I can't do something similar."

Sideswipe turned fully to face her. "You know, I may not be 'Perceptor' smart, but I'm not stupid."

Sideswipe started counting off on his fingers. "Firestar in the rec room, Arcee in the washracks, Aqua to hack the roster schedule…even if you are completely booked, you've got a freaking miniature army at your beck and call, you don't exactly need to do your own dirty work."

Elita laid a hand on her chest in mock shock.

"Now Sideswipe, I am appalled that you would suggest that I would use my Congtingents valuable skills and time for something as silly as pranks against your person. But, hypothetically…"

Elita's grin turned positively wicked.

"…such actions would certainly be within the realm of possibility."

Sideswipe gave her a flat look. "Just how long do you generally make someone your whipping bot?"

"Depends how long it takes them to learn their lesson."

Sideswipe threw his hands in the air. "'Don't frag off Elita One, especially when she can network!' Consider the lesson learned!"

Elita shook her and sighed. "Sideswipe, Sideswipe, Sideswipe, you clearly have completely missed the entire purpose of this endeavor."

Sideswipe blinked. "Eh? Isn't this supposed to be the 'unofficial punishment' for the goo thing?"

Elita raised an optic ridge. "If we were to pretend your recent run of bad luck had truly been premeditated and carried out by an outside force as a part of your well earned 'unofficial punishment'…"

Sideswipe snorted - of course she'd never admit to actually _doing_ anything!

"…then it should be clarified that it would not be because I was pranked, but because I was pranked instead of Prowl."

Sideswiped pinched his nasal ridge and offlined his optics. He was gaining a whole new respect for the processor aches Prowl complained about sometimes. "…Elita, my processors are turning to molasses as we speak. I really don't have the memory space for deep thinking right now. With all do respect, and I mean that from the bottom of my Spark...what in the Pit are you talking about?"

"Alright then, try thinking about this: what unifying quality did all of your, hm, 'events' have?"

"...They were fragging annoying?"

"For you, maybe. More imporantly, they were carefully designed with you, your person, your habits, in mind so that no one else could simply walk into a trap meant for you and you alone."

Sideswipe stared.

Elita waggled a reprimanding finger at Sideswipe. "It's one thing if you set up a prank meant for just about anyone. It's quite another once you get in the business of setting a trap for a specific target. You can't trust fate and luck that only the right target will fall into the trap, otherwise you might find yourself creating more trouble than it was worth. I don't mind a little silliness and general harmless fun, but I am far less lenient with sloppy delivery and careless mistakes."

Elita patted Sideswipes shoulder as she walked past. "I am a firm believer that if you are going to be doing anything, then you might as well do it right. I don't tolerate anything less, not with my Contingent, and certainly not with myself. From what I've heard, you're a good deal smarter and more creative and most bots give you credit for; you shouldn't settle for anything less either."

Sideswipe turned and watched the Femme Commander, guerilla warfare specialist and leader of an underground resistance, a femme whose entire Contingent had become skilled in traps and secret attacks by sheer necessity and lifted it to an art form, who could somehow rig their traps to activate when, and ONLY when, the proper target was in the proper place, either with special sensors or simply knowing her targets habitual movements, calmly continue down the corridor.

Sideswipe crossed his arms as she turned the corner and disappeared, a contemplative expression on his face.

oOoOoOoOoOo

"We've narrowed down possible locations for Autobot city to four separate areas." Prowl droned on. "They're listed in order of most optimal to least, though there are also extenuating factors of whether or not we'll be able to get the land permanently, not to mention the still outstanding issue of our residency status."

Prowl passed out datapads with the promised information to the Autobots seated at the tables, each one taking one pad before passing on the rest to the next bot over.

"Has there been any progress in us being declared an independent nation within the United States?" Elita asked as she took her own data pad.

"Yes and no. A bill had been written and sent to the Senate regarding just that, but it's being hotly contested by people worried about the implications of it, including fear that we're getting relatively preferential treatment compared to the humans already living near those areas, and that it'll essentially be inviting us to stay permanently, along with the war. There's not much we can do to speed up the process."

From long experience, Jazz knew that the minute human politics came in the discussion, it was a foregone conclusion that he could look forward to several hours of absolutely nothing happening. Jazz dropped his head to the table, already feeling his CPU rusting to a halt. He hated meetings with a fiery passion, and if he'd known how many of them he'd have to have attend as an officer he might have thought twice about accepting the Primes offer of making him Third in Command and Head of Special Ops.

The rest of the officers, well used to his dramatics, completely ignored him.

"Isn't there already a precedent for this?" Elita asked, flicking through the information on her data pad. "I remember reading that the Native American reservations were considered their own - "

"_**BOW CHICKA WOW WOW!"**_

Every bot in the room, even the near catatonic Jazz, jumped up as unmistakable 70's porn music sudden blasted in the room. They all stared at Elita, who was staring at the display on her data pad with shocked horror as the bright colors of the lurid display on her data pad reflected off her shocked silver face.

"…Elita?"

CLACK-_CRACK_!

Elita slammed the data pad face down hard enough to crack it in half, effectively ending the music. The room was dead silent as everyone stared at her.

"I, I was under impression that the Native American reservations were considered their own nations as well, with their own laws and such," she went on, as if she nothing had happened and pretending that she was NOT blushing. "Can we not have something of a similar nature?"

Jazz had to put his head down again, this time to muffle his hysterical laughter in his arms.

oOoOoOoOoOo

Seven halls and three decks away, Sideswipe cackled.

* * *

**AN:** "Pure pink evil" was coined by Fields-of-Heather. I just HAD to steal it. ^_^


	8. Exhausted

Special thanks to **Fields of Heather**, who inspired this story when she practically wrote her own characters scene in her message to me, and generously allowed me to completely steal it.

**Meme:** Exhausted  
**Universe:** G1  
**Warnings:** Femmes. By the bucket loads.  
**Summary:** Elita commands an elite team of some of the best and brightest Cybertron has to offer. One would be hard pressed to believe this after spending a day _with_ said team.

**Guest starring:  
**_Aqua_, by Flameshield  
_Sneakthief_, by Fields of Heather (duh)  
_Sparklight_, by Misao-CG  
_Springshift_, by staringsideways  
_Tempest_, by A Midnight Dreary

Mention of _Violet_, by Hiezen  
Mention of _Wirecrash_, by Quelara

_Vaportrail_ is the formally unnamed orange femme. _Knockout_ is the formally unnamed green femme. Because they were there and I could.

The rest, believe it or not, are cannon. You can look them up at transformers(dot)wikia(dot)com.

* * *

Elita pushed herself away from the desk, grimacing as she felt something in her spinal strut creak and protest about the sudden change in position. Primus, how long had she been huddled over her desk this time? Actually, scratch that, she didn't want to know. Long enough to make their CMO Wirecrash supremely annoyed, she was willing to bet.

Her energy levels were getting low, and she was feeling mentally exhausted from pouring over the plans, data, and statistics competing for space on her desk. She gave the datapads a blank look, before standing and resolutely heading for the door. She still had a lot of work to do, but maybe she could take a quick break, at least long enough to go down to the rec room for an energon run instead of asking for someone to bring her a cube.

Leaving her office was her first mistake.

oOoOoOoOoOo

"I already told you, I need to finish this line of code! Can't this wait until tomorrow or next deca-orn??"

"Probably, but tomorrow or next deca-orn you'll just have more excuses. I'm just taking the initiative!"

"Please don't trouble yourself on my account. I'm sure you're very busy."

"Not too busy to spend time with my favorite introverted scientist!"

Elita stopped, listened, rolled her optics, and turned down the hall. This was a familiar "argument", and they were usually short because the meeker Glyph tended to back down quickly to the more exuberant Vibes. Except this time it sounded like the scientist was digging her heels in, and Vibes was being as stubborn as ever. Vibes meant well, whatever she was doing, but Elita should probably get over there before she accidently steamrolled right over the scientist.

Elita turned a corner, and stopped with one pede in the air as she stared.

"Don't worry G, it's no problem at all! I'm just doing the responsible thing as your friend and make sure you're still functioning, that's all!"

"I'm flattered, but you shouldn't. You really, _really_ shouldn't. And please let go of my pedes!"

Their resident scientist and code-breaker, Glyph, was holding onto the doorframe to her lab with dear life as the taller and very determined Vibes pulled at her legs, smiling and looking like she was having a grand old time – as if Vibes could ever feel frustrated about anything. Glyph, on the other hand, looked far less amused.

Elita herself honestly didn't know if she was amused or annoyed.

"C'mon Glyph, you've been holing yourself in your labs for three orns now," Vibes told her reasonably, light glinting off her visor. "That's just not healthy. At least come out and have some energon with the rest of us."

"I'll refuel when I need to, and I don't need to right now! Look, I appreciate the thought, but I promised Elita I'd have this coding finished as soon as possible, so could you please let me get back to work?"

"Elita won't mind if you take a little break, Glyph."

"You can't make me!"

"Well, I'd rather not, but actually, I can."

Glyph stopped for a moment as she remembered that the dark red femme holding her legs hostage, contrary to what her behavior suggested, was actually the Contingents Head of Intelligence and Third in Command.

Elita took advantage of the brief lull to make her presence known.

"Vibes has a point, Glyph," she said, coming over to the pair. "You've been in there for three orns straight. I won't begrudge you for taking a break."

The blue armored Glyph squeeked as she caught sight of her Commander, looking like she desperately wanted to hide but not willing to release her death grip on the door frame. Vibes however, just grinned and didn't seem the least bit surprised, the long thinly triangular sensors on her head twitching in their hidden sockets.

"Elita, just the femme I wanted to see. Help me convince Glyph that her lab is NOT a permanent residence before she forgets where the door is."

"It's not as if I never leave my lab!" Glyph protested. "I've just been busy. You two of all bots should understand that! ……And can you let go of my legs Vibes?"

"But if I do that, you'll run away!" Vibes playfully protested. Elita gave Glyph a look.

"She does have a point."

"Elita, you can't be serious!"

The pink femme sighed. "No, not really. Vibes, put Glyph down, I can't talk to her when she's horizontal like this. Glyph, I'm ordering you not to run away."

Vibes complied, and Glyph picked herself up. She glanced back into the safety of her lab, but managed to keep herself from bolting like a scared petro-rabbit.

Elita put her hands on her hips. "Let me guess. You…"

She pointed to Glyph.

"…want to finish the coding I gave you as soon as physically possible, because you are a dedicated worker with a strong sense of duty, and don't appreciate having anyone infringe upon that. On top of that, you value your privacy and don't like having others encroach on it. So, you feel that Vibes is over-stepping her bounds and invading your space, in several senses of the word. Whereas you…"

She pointed to Vibes.

"…believe Glyph is overworking herself and is developing a pattern of behavior you deem detrimental and isolating, something that should not be tolerated any longer. You consider personal relationships important, and seeing Glyph seemingly shut herself away from everyone is something you find alarming, and thus you've taken it upon yourself to 'help' her in any way you see fit. If it seems over the top to others, that's fine because drastic times call for drastic measures."

Glyphs optics shuttered in surprise at her Commanders accurate fingering. Vibes nodded.

"Yeah, that's pretty much how it is." She said. "You're always talking about how we need to be a united, cohesive unit, and the only way that'll happen is if we all interact with each other on a regular basis."

Elita gave her a flat look. "Perhaps, but don't assume I'm automatically on your side, Vibes."

The visored femme seemed genuinely taken aback. "What? Ma'am, you can't tell me you think it's okay for anyone to-"

The hand came up again. Vibes zipped her lips.

"The coding is not a Priority One task, true. But you know Glyph as well as I do. You can't force her, or anyone else, to conform what you think of as acceptable sociable behavior, nor push them faster than they're comfortable with. You, out of all of us, should know that."

The former physiologist turned Intelligence operator and Interrogator kicked against the floor, her antennae drooping slightly. "Well, yeah, but it was getting really bad," she explained quietly. "Some of the femmes haven't seen her in _deca-orns_. That kind of isolation and solitude's not healthy, mentally or emotionally. Even the worst loners need contact sometimes, or else they go crazy. The usual tricks weren't working anymore, so I had to get more drastic."

"So you decided to stage a one-femme intervention?" Elita asked. The corner of Vibes mouth twitched upwards in a smile.

"Pretty much yeah."

Glyph stared at Vibes with an unreadable expression. Elita turned to her.

"What do you think of this, Glyph?" she asked.

Glyph looked down and pressed her fingers together in a familiar nervous habit.

"I…suppose I've been a bit…standoffish perhaps lately." She admitted slowly. "Perhaps a short break would not be detrimental to my work or myself personally."

"Great!" Vibes exclaimed, face and antennae perking up immediately. In one fell swoop she practically scooped Glyph up in her arms and dragged the poor femme down the hall with great enthusiasm. "I know a few awesome drinking games I can teach you! We should find Chromia and Tempest, they can hold high-grade like nobody's business!"

"W-wait! Just a short break!" Glyph insisted weakly as Vibes practically carried her away.

Elita watched them go, wondering what the point of all that was if Vibes was just going to ignore her anyway. Still, she couldn't find it in herself to be too annoyed with either one of them, or that she had just been almost blatantly ignored. Vibes, if nothing else, was enthusiastic, and Glyph did need to get out of her lab and reconnect once in a while.

Then an entirely new pair of voices drifted down the hall, with entirely less entertaining content.

"What the slag is your fracking malfunction?!

"My malfunction? What about yours, you uptight little glitch? Since when are you going to figure out that MY business is none of YOUR business?"

"It's called 'trying to be friendly' you little freak! Why do you keep trying to bite my head off!?

"Because you can't get a clue when you're not wanted!"

Elita grimaced, off-lined her optics and sighed. Firestar (the first speaker) and Knockout were at it again, in a fight equally familiar as Vibes and Glyphs (if the latter pair's can even be called a "fight"), but a great deal less amusing.

Now, Firestar and Knockout were both good femmes and good soldiers, and she was glad to have them both. But the fact of the matter was they had drastically different personalities that clashed more often than not. Firestar was talkative and passionate, with a bad habit of steam rolling over others but was generally so friendly and well meaning that most bots couldn't hold it against her. Knockout, on the other hand, was reclusive, private, and anti-social, and she didn't like talking about her past – as far as Elita knew, Vaportrail was the only other femme on base besides herself who Knockout had told about it (and Elita was still trying to figure out how that happened).

On top of that, Firestar was more on the impatient side, and Knockout was VERY slow to open up to others, something the former couldn't seem to understand.

But that wasn't the worst of it. The worst of it was Firestar was proud and quick to fight back when she thought she was being slighted, while Knockout had a special talent for making even the most well meaning remark sound caustic and insulting.

Hence…

"You know what Knockout, I think you WANT me to hit you!"

"Oh please, you really want to get in a fistfight with _me_?"

"Don't tempt me! I'll have you on the ground begging for mercy before you can land a single hit on me!"

"Care to put your credits where your mouth is, Firestar?"

"How about you don't?" Elita said smoothly as she came over, her calmness like a balm on the rising hot anger between the pair.

The green and red femmes jumped away from each other, going from snarling rage to 'drone caught in the headlights' in a snap. Knockout crossed her arms and looked to the side, frowning angrily, while Firestar looked slightly more contrite. Keyword being 'slightly'.

Elita crossed her arms and looked at them both. "Do I need to ask what set it off this time?" she asked, almost rhetorically.

"Firestar was being a nosy little glitch again." Knockout deadpanned. Firestar whipped her head around, shocked and disgusted with the accusation.

"Don't you DARE pin this on me!" she retorted angrily, gearing up for another fight. "You are just too slagging sensitive! Just what is the big deal?"

"The 'deal', Firestar," Elita interrupted firmly, before Knockout could respond and feed the fire, "is that Knockout is a private femme and you need to respect that. If she doesn't want to tell you something, you have to respect that. You want her trust, you need to earn it."

"But I…!" she started, but stopped at the look on Elita's face. Firestar crossed her arms and dropped her gaze, clearly not liking what she was hearing. Hopefully though, she'd take it to spark this time.

If wishes were fishes…

"You're not off the hook either, Knockout," Elita went on, and the green femme immediately dropped her smirk. "Firestar may have been annoying you, but that gives you no right to insult and threaten her."

Now both femmes were avoiding looking at her. Elita sighed and pinched her nasal ridge as she felt her processor start to complain with an ache.

"Listen you two. I've put up with your feud for a long time now because I had been hoping you could work out your differences by yourselves like mature femmes. But if you continue this immature and destructive behavior I swear to Primus I will lock you both in a room together until you learn to get along or off-line each other – and frankly, I don't particularly care which anymore."

Both femmes, who knew when Elita was joking and when she was dead serious, stared at her in abject horror.

"Has anyone seen Sneakthief? Or Springshift?"

Early on, the three femmes might have exclaimed in surprise, jumped, or doubted the functionality of their CPU's when an orange and purple femme suddenly materialized out of the wall as easily and casually as if it were an open door. But after the first few millennia, they had all gotten used to Vaportrails tendency to abuse her phasing ability.

"No, why?" Knockout asked, immediately softening as she spoke to her friend.

Firestar tensed and crossed her arm irritably as she watched Knockout, who _refused_ to act the least bit friendly to anyone else, act so familiarly with the only other femme on base even more socially immature than she was.

Seriously, how did Vaportrial do it???

Vaportrail scowled. "Because my entire supply of wax has gone missing, and Sneakthief is the only one who could have done it."

"Why on Cybertron would she steal your wax?" Firestar asked, curious in spite of herself.

"Because she can!" Vaportrail exclaimed, throwing her arms up. "Because she needs to practice! Because she's got it in for me! Because she did it just for kicks! I don't know what's going through that nutcase's CPU!"

"I'll be sure to let Sneakthief know you're looking for her the next time I see her," Elita said dryly. "But why do you need Springshift?"

"Springshift? Oh, I don't really need her for myself, Roulette does. She's stuck in her room."

"…How can she be stuck in her room?" Firestar asked incredulously. Vaportrail shrugged.

"The door malfunctioned sometime this morning, and she's been stuck in there ever since. I was passing by, and she yelled at me to get Springshift down there as fast as physically possible to fix the door before she shot it out."

"The door malfunctioned." Elita repeated flatly. "Right after Springshift finished her routine maintenance of all the doors, that one malfunctioned."

"That's right. Looks like Springshift wasn't as thorough as she says she is."

Actually, Elita had a pretty good idea of why the door was suddenly stuck shut and trapping that one particular femme inside her quarters, and it had nothing to do with Springshift being careless.

The processor ache started to rear its head again.

"I see," Elita said, resisting the urge to pinch her nasal ridge again, a little habit that sometimes helped with the aches. Sometimes. Elita instead turned her attention back to the original problem.

"Knockout, Firestar, go back to your business. If I hear you're having another altercation, I don't care who started it, I _will_ send you both to the brig, where you can share a cell."

"Hey, Firestar's the only who starts it because she doesn't understand the concept of 'privacy' and 'personal space'!" Vaportrail said irately, standing up for her friend. "Why should Knockout be punished too?"

Elita gave her a hard look. "Because Knockout is just as guilty for encouraging and enflaming them. Do not argue with me, I am not in the mood."

Vaportrail may have been petty and argumentative, but she wasn't stupid. The femmes dispersed, Firestar (thankfully) going in the opposite direction of Knockout and Vaportrail, and Elita was free to finally make it to the rec room in peace.

Evidently Vaportrail hadn't put much effort into finding Springshift: Elita spotted her as soon as she entered the rec room, sitting at a table with Aqua and Tempest, she and Tempest doing most of the talking and laughing while the blue spy listened with a smile and chuckle.

Elita debated getting her energon before or after speaking to the green mechanic. She decided to wait; approaching them with a cube would give the impression she was coming to join them for a drink, and she didn't think they'd be too willing to let her go too soon. While she wasn't averse to spending time with them, she really didn't have that much to spare today. She still had a lot of work to finish, after all.

"Elita, coming to join us?" Springshift asked jovially as she spied her Commander approaching. Elita stopped by the table and zeroed in on the mechanic.

"Springshift, do you have any idea why Roulettes door has spontaneously malfunctioned when it was working just fine yesterday and had a maintenance check just last night?" she asked, point blank.

Springshift didn't even blink.

"Really, her doors malfunctioning? Well if that don't just beat all." The green femme said calmly, taking a sip of her cube. "Can't imagine how I could have missed a glitch like that."

Tempest grinned, and turned to their third member with exaggerated casualness. "Amazing coincidence that Roulettes door fritzed just a few joors after she called Sprinshift – what was it again Aqua? I wasn't there."

"I believe the term Roulette used was 'dumpster diver.'" Aqua supplied helpfully. "Maybe Primus is trying to tell her something."

"Maybe," the jet agreed, fighting down a grin even as her downward swept wings twitched, betraying her amusement. "Someone should have told her that was a _really_ stupid joke to tell to Springshift, of all bots."

"Probably." Aqua agreed jovially.

This time Elita really did pinch her nasal ridge. She counted to five, willed the ache away, and after releasing her ridge she spoke to Springshift as calmly as she could.

"Springshift, have the door fixed permanently before Roulettes shift starts, and be sure she gets her energon before she goes on duty."

"I can fix her door, but I can't promise permanence," Springshift warned. "Machines break down all the time, and it's not like we've got the cutting edge top-of-the-line tech to work with."

"If she can't fix it, Ol' Rusty can still get Roulette out!" Tempest offered with freakish enthusiasm.

'Freakish' because Ol' Rusty was what she called the huge gun she carried around. And by huge, she meant "as long as Tempest is tall," and Tempest was one of the taller femmes on base.

"Tempest, under no circumstances are you to shoot Roulettes door off," Elita ordered. She paused. "Unless the room spontaneously catches fire on the inside. THEN you can blast it off."

Tempest hovered somewhere between disappointment and hopefulness, and Elita honestly couldn't decide which was more disturbing.

As quickly as politely possible, she turned and left the rec room before the dark blue flyer could offer any more suggestions-that-were-actually-attempts-to-get-permission-to-blow-slag-up. The jet was an incredible asset on the battle-field, but there was a reason why she freaked a lot of her teammates out.

Of course, making it back to her office peacefully would have been too much to ask for.

Muffled voices, alternately loud and soft, could be heard, and Elita slowed her steps as she caught them. From the sounds of it, they were coming from the inventory room, and if they were, then Elita didn't need to hear and recognize the voices or hear the words to know who it was and what the problem was THIS time.

For several seconds, she seriously considered pretending she didn't hear anything and to just keep going. But her stupid sense of responsibility – slag it – wouldn't let her.

Elita dropped her head down and glared at the floor. Or rather, at the center of the planet were Primus was said to slumber.

"So, did you just randomly decide 'Hey, I know, let's have every single pair of femmes that can't stand each other pick today to hit each other's buttons for fun!' because you wanted to test my patience, or because you were just bored and decided it's 'Let's Drive Elita Crazy!' day? I'm giving you fair warning now: keep this up, and I can't promise I won't violently attack someone."

If she listened _veeeery_ carefully, Elita could have sworn she could hear someone laughing at her.

Taking the detour, Elita approached the inventory room and keyed the door open, already knowing what she would find.

"Why the frag did you take three vials of cybertronium and a pair of stasis cuffs from the inventory without signing out for it like you're supposed to??" an enraged young femme was not-quite-yelling, her doorwings twitching in agitation.

"Glyph asked me to pick the cybertromium up for her, that's why." The other, taller femme replied easily with a smile. "I was just doing my little buddy a favor. Can't fault me for that, can't ya?"

"I don't care WHAT your intentions were! You can't just take things at your discretion! There's a reason we have a sign out sheet that everyone is supposed to use! You're the Supply officer, you of all bot's should understand that!"

"Uh, hello? My name is "Sneak-Thief," remember? I'm supposed to be all sneaky and stuff, signing out for stuff is totally against my character. C'mon Sparky, no harm, no foul, right?"

"No harm? NO HARM?! Do you have ANY appreciation for the absolute…absolute…this is completely unacceptable behavior!" 'Sparky' near shrieked, her doorwings vibrating with her frustration.

Elita banged a fist against the doorway, a metallic ring echoing through the room and effectively getting the arguing femmes attention. They both jumped like sparkling caught in the act of stealing from the grease-cookie jar and whipped around to stare at her with identical expression of surprise and slight guilt.

Going on appearance alone, it could easily have been believed they were sisters, partly because their color schemes were so similar; the shorter one being black and blue, the taller blue and black. But mostly because the elder one seemed to take so much joy out of driving her younger counterpart up the wall and down the other side.

The younger femme immediately calmed as her high-command-shyness took over, but the taller femme was all smiles and charm. "Elita! Fancy seeing you here? Did you need anything?"

A few joors ago, Elita might have had the patience for this. But, as it had already been established, her near limitless patience was being stretched mighty thin today. Her words were short, clipped, and brooked no argument.

"Sparklight. Sneakthief. My office. Now."

The arguing pair, thankfully, were smart enough not to argue.

They followed Elita back towards her office, taking a slightly more roundabout route while Elita forced herself to calm down and not let her mounting irritation cloud her judgment. It wouldn't be fair to take out her frustrations on these two.

So caught up she was in chanting _'calm and peaceful calm and peaceful calm and peaceful'_ in her CPU, she didn't notice the oncoming danger until Sneakthief stopped her forward movement with a hand on her shoulder.

"What is it, Sneakth…" Elita trailed off as she saw what had arrested the attention of both the Supply Officer and her Security Director: the hall they were about to cross was completely covered in a shiny, purplish-tinted substance from wall to wall. Elita leaned over and looked left and right. Sure enough, almost the entire hall had been covered in the substance.

"What is this? Sparklight asked, kneeling down. She dipped two fingers into it, rubbed a little, brought it back to her olfactory senses, and felt it with her fingers.

"Looks like wax," Sneakthief mentioned as Sparklight went about her examination. "And a lot of it."

A pause.

"You're not going to accuse me of stealing our entire wax supply?" she asked the kneeling Director sarcastically.

"Believe it or not, Sneakthief, I don't go about randomly accusing people of activities I have no proof of," Sparklight answered archly. "Besides, the wax is one of the few things in the inventory that _hasn't_ been moved. This did not come from our supplies. I don't think we even HAVE this much in inventory."

"So where…" Elita trailed off again, this time as she remembered a certain orange femme. "No, wait, I can guess where. Better questions: who, how, and why."

"AAAIIIIIIEEEEEEEE!"

The three femmes jumped back, Sparklight falling backwards on her aft in her rush to get away, just as a teal colored blur came sliding down the waxed hallway with a high pitched squeal, a squeal that came to an abrupt end with a CRASH! as she hit the end of the hall.

"Moonracer! Are you alright?" Elita exclaimed, leaning out the doorway and peering down the hall where the young femme had slid, Sneakthief and Sparklight doing the same.

At the end of the hall, an upside down Moonracer craned her neck to look at her concerned Commander.

"Hi Elita," she said with light cheeriness. "Guess what: I found Vaportrails wax."

"Are you hurt?"

"Mostly just my pride," Moonracer assured, untangling herself. "At least now I know why Violet was in such a good mood, and why she was in such a hurry to get out of the base."

"_Violet_???" Sparklight exclaimed, almost sounding scandalized. "You think _Violet_ did this?"

"She might not say a lot, but she actually has a wicked sense of humor," Moonracer said, slightly defensive of the jet. "And now I know why she was smiling all morning, and why she was so eager to leave for patrol."

Come to think of it, the purple-optic femme had been itching to leave earlier for her patrol, but at the time Elita had assumed it had something to do with the Contingents lone Seeker getting jittery after being inside and underground for so long.

Violet had more or less been a mercenary before joining the Contingent, and had fought for both sides of the war, mostly the Decepticons because of their high Seeker count. A few vorns ago, she had approached Elita, alone, about joining under her command permanently. The commander, after hearing her out, had accepted her. To this day Elita remained the only femme in the Contingent who knew the entire story behind Violets defection.

She was also the only Autobot to know the entire story of Violet's absent trine mates.

Violets integration into the Contingent had been slow and sometimes painful, especially with Tempest. You'd think that the two fliers would get along best, even if only one of them was an actual Seeker, but Tempest was fiercely loyal to the Autobot cause and she did not forgive easily.

But if Violet was feeling comfortable enough to be playing silly pranks, then it meant she was finally starting to feel at home with them, at least a little. That was a good thing…or so Elita kept trying to remind herself as she pinched her nasal ridge again. It was getting harder and harder to stave off the growing pain behind her optics.

As much as she wanted to be happy for Violet showing her rare but real playful side, couldn't she have picked _some other day_ for it??

"Attention Autobots," Elita announced on her comm. listlessly. "Use caution when using corridor 3A until further notice. Also, Vaportrail, we've found your wax. But I doubt you'll want it back."

Someone coughed loudly.

"Also, Sneakthief had nothing to do with its disappearance." Elita added dully.

That done, she then focused her attention on the youngest femme as she straightened herself out. "Moonracer, see if you can't set up signs or something to warn anyone coming this way that the corridor is hazardous to cross."

"Yes ma'am!"

The trio left the eager-to-please Moonracer to her task, hopping across the afflicted corridor to avoid a pratfall.

They (finally!) managed to make it to Elita's office without any more interruptions, mishaps, or arguments. Sparklight and Sneakthief, perhaps sensing their commanders souring mood, quietly took their seats in the twin chairs in front of Elita's desk.

The rose femme slid into her seat, leaned forward so her elbows where on the desk surface, and steepled her fingers as she gave the pair a long, inscrutable look. The ever unflappable Sneakthief appeared unaffected (as if she'd ever show nervousness or anxiety if she could help it), but Sparklight looked like she wanted a good wall or three between them. Neither of them were about to say anything before their commander did.

Silence.

Silence.

Silence.

Complete silence in which Elita did nothing but stare, somehow managing to drill holes in both their heads with her optics without needing to turn her head either way. Sneakthief had long stopped trying to match it, and was examining her fingertips in a desperate attempt at distraction. Poor Sparklight looked about ready for a system crash from the suffocating tension in the room that screamed _'dear sweet primus she's going to kill us dead!'_

When Elita finally spoke, it was in a soft, even, almost quiet voice that filled the entire room and drowned out all other distractions.

"Had this been an isolated incident, I would be content to let the two of you work it out yourselves like the mature professionals I know you both are. Had this been a rare occurrence, I would trust you to resolve the issue yourselves. Had either one of you been new, I would chalk it up to clashing personalities that needed time to adjust to one another, after which these…conflicts would not happen anymore. But this is none of those things.

"The two of you are some of my longest standing allies, and you have known each other for just as long. When you must, you can work together as well as anyone else, which tells me you DO have the professionalism and intellect to put personal feelings aside for the greater good. I only wish that "professionalism and intellect" carried over when there WASN'T a crisis."

Sparklight cringed, and even Sneakthief was looking uncomfortable.

Elita focused her attention on her Security Director. "Tell me Sparklight: what was the catalyst this time? The _specific_ catalyst." She corrected quickly.

Sparklight drew herself up as straight as she could, kept her hands folded in her lap, and stiffened her doorwings, creating the most serious impression she could manage.

Sneakthief rolled her optics when she thought no one was looking.

"Ma'am, earlier today when I was going through the inventory, I noticed we were missing three vials of cybertronium and a set of stasis cuffs, none of which had been missing this morning. Since Sneakthief is the only bot on base who has been in there recently, I confronted her about it."

"Glyph needed the cybertronium for an experiment she was working on," Sneakthief explained, not needing to wait for Elita to verbalize the question. "It's a side project of hers, working to synthesize the stuff for our use. One less thing to raid for, you know?"

"And the stasis cuffs?" Elita prodded.

Sneakthief's grin turned down-right wicked. "Aqua wants to spend some 'quality time' with her bond mate, and she wanted my help in making sure it was a memorable date night for them. I was just doing a good deed for my good friend. She'll give the cuffs back sometime tomorrow, the orn after at the latest."

"So you decided not the sign out for them, even though you know perfectly well by now that it's one of Sparklights pet peeves when bot's don't, is because…?"

Sneakthief raised an optic ridge as if the answer should have been obvious. "That's not what I do. I don't 'sign out' for stuff. Tried it once; gave me a rash. Besides, Sparky's rules and forms are all so convoluted even Glyph gets dizzy trying to figure them out, and this is a femme who writes programming for high-end computers _for fun_! I'd still be in there if I bothered to even try."

"Just because you think procedure is a little inconvenient doesn't give you the right to break them!" Sparklight said sharply, not yelling yet, but getting closer to it.

Elita wasn't about to let this degenerate into another fight, so she quickly spoke up again.

"Sneakthief, you know perfectly well how seriously Sparklight takes inventory, yet you continue to insist on pressing her buttons even when you know better. Your baiting her is not funny."

"I'm not trying bait her at all!" Sneaktheif insisted. "It's just…we have drastically different points of view on the matter. I'm the Supply Officer. I have just as much jurisdiction over that room and its contents as Sparky does. Technically, I have even more. What's the big deal of me saving a little time and trouble?"

"It's your job to GET the stuff!" Sparklight exclaimed, finally losing her composure. "But it's my job to keep TRACK of it! I have to keep track of our limited supplies and make sure they are used in the most efficient manner possible. The longer we can stretch what we have, the fewer raiding parties we need to send out, and the less often Autobot lives are put at risk for dubious returns. I'm trying to make every scrap of supplies and resources available to us last as long as possible and then some, and I can't do that if you keep helping yourself to everything on a whim! You treat this like it's a game, but it's not!"

Sneakthief stared blankly at Sparklight. So did Elita.

Sparklight fell back into her chair, crossing her arms and looking away. "I don't know why I'm trying to talk to you." She muttered. "You never listen anyway."

Elita lowered her hands so her palms were flat on the desk. From the look on Sneakthiefs face, she had never heard, nor thought of, this side of Sparklight before.

"Sneakthief, what do you think of this?" she asked, more gently this time.

The blue femme glanced at Elita, then at Sparklight. As if coming to a decision, she reached over and took one of Sparklights hands, to the smaller femmes clear surprise. Now that she had her attention, Sneakthief looked her straight in the optic, and spoke more seriously than either femme had heard her speak in a long, long time.

"Sparky – Sparklight, I know I drive you insane, and most times it seems like I make a game out of messing with the inventory just to get a reaction out of you. I admit, a lot of times, that's exactly what I'm doing. But I honestly had no idea just how much my actions were affecting you. I never meant to make you think I was trying to belittle your work or undermine your efforts, and I'm sincerely sorry if I made you think like that. I never meant to hurt you."

Sparklight stared back at Sneakthief with wide optics, lips slightly parted as her hand rose up to rest lightly above her spark, sincerely touched by the spark-felt apology she was receiving. Elita watched her Supply Officer with surprise and pride.

"Sneaks…" Sparklight began in a soft voice, using the Supply Officers beloved nickname for the very first time.

With the same gravity and spark-felt sincerity as before, the kind that not even Sneaktheif could fake, she went on.

"From now on, whenever I take anything out of the inventory, I'll have it back before you have time to notice it's even gone."

Dead silence.

Sparklight released an inarticulate roar of exasperation and motioned as if she was about to strangle Sneakthief.

"THAT'S NOT THE POINT, YOU LITTLE PSYCHO!!"

Elita looked at her desk and wondered how many head bangs it would take before she could knock herself unconscious.

oOoOoOoOoOo

"_So long, so long, don't need you no more. So long, so long, just can't care no more_," Chromia sang softly to herself down the hall. She was in a particularly good mood this morning for some reason, good enough to try and remember that old song she used to love when she was young, something about a young femme dumping her no-good boyfriend in a creative and humiliating manner.

"_Can't you take a hint, I want you out_…aw slag, what was the next line again?"

Chromia paused in her step as she saw her commander coming down the hallway towards her with a data pad in hand. Chromia brightened. Maybe Elita would remember, she loved that song too.

"Hey, Elita, remember that old song we used to – oof!"

Chromia had been interrupted by Elita shoving the data pad right into her chest.

"I'm taking a mental health day, Chromia." Elita told her without preamble. "You're in charge until I don't feel like committing homicide anymore. Warning: Knockout and Firestar are trying to kill each other again for no discernable reason, Vibes just staged another party intervention for Glyph and I have no idea where they've gone, Sparklight is chasing Sneakthief with killer intent, Roulettes stuck in her room and Springshift may or may not let her out sometime today because of a bad joke on Roulettes part. By the way, in case you didn't hear before, Corridor 3A is a hazard zone until Violet gets back so she can join the punishment detail in cleaning it up.

"Any questions?"

Chromia shuttered her optics.

"Wow. Not even lunch time and you've already had a full orn."

"Tell me about it," Elita agreed wearily. "I've broken up two arguments, got dismissed by my own 3iC, lost my scientist of aforementioned 3iC, discovered my demolitions expert has a really weird sense of humor at the most inconvenient of times, and I just remembered I forgot my energon, which was the entire point of my leaving my office in the first place. Sometimes I feel less like a military commander and more like a counselor at a femme youngling summer camp for the young and deranged."

"Yeah, but you love them anyway."

A high pitched squeal of delight arrested both of their attentions, and they turned just in time to see Arcee and Flare Up slide down the waxed corridor one after the other in childish glee, their laughter reverberating against the walls and fading as they slid down the corridor. Several seconds later they heard a muffled 'thump' as the femmes hit the wall that had stopped Moonracer before.

Elita quirked a tired but genuine smile. "That I do. When I'm not being tempted to throttle the lot of them."


	9. Kick Ass

**IMPORTANT!** I have enough femmes for my stories! I send a hundred loves and thanks to everyone that contributed, but I don't need anymore. Sorry if this dissapoints any readers.

**Meme:** Kick Ass  
**Universe:** G1  
**Warnings:** Me completely butchering the laws of physics. But since we're talking about an 80's cartoon that didn't place much stock in scientific accuracy either, I think I'm well within my bounds. ^_^  
**Summary:** In which Elita demonstrates why she's the Femme Commander and ignores Alpha Trion's warnings…again.

**Guest Starring**:  
**Aqua** (by Flameshield)  
**Springshift** (by staringsideways). Check out her picture and bio at tinyurl DOT com FORWARDSLASH nnktfe.  
**Wirecrash** (by Quelara)

Reference to **Violet** (by Hiezen).

"**Vaportrail**" is actually the Unnamed Orange Femme in "Search for Alpha Trion," given a name and personality by yours truly.

Orn: 1 day  
Breem: 1 minute

* * *

PSEEEW! PSEEEW! PSEEW!

BANG!

PSWEEW! PSEEW!

CRAACK!

"We're getting our afts handed to us here!" Chromia shouted over the weapon fire and small explosions.

"You think?!" Springshift shot back, as she stuck her gun up over their little shelter and shot blindly at the Decepticons. "Frag it, I thought this was supposed to be a quick and quiet infiltration!! How in the holy Pit did it turn into this??"

"Ask Aqua, she can probably guess." An orange and purple femme 'muttered' none too quietly. The blue and teal femme in question flinched slightly, but didn't respond, too focused on trying to get a good shot in without having her own head blown off.

"Don't you dare start Vaportrail," Chromia growled warningly. "This is not the time to be blaming each other."

"Not each other…just the so called 'spy' who told us all about Shockwaves secret new project, that it wasn't finished yet and we had a good chance of grabbing it for ourselves before One Eye could even know we were here. Oh wait, hold on, turns out the secret new project WAS finished, that it was actually a portable force field that COMPLETELY blocks all OUR shots while letting THEIR'S go through, and her so called intelligence was actually planted information for a trap to lure us all out!" Vaportrail said acidly, voice progressively rising, glaring heatedly at Aqua's profile.

"Shut it Vapor!" Springshift snapped. "You're not helping make this any better!"

Aqua's yellow optics tightened, as did her grip on her gun, but the saboteur kept her silence.

"Enough, all of you!" Elita commanded over the noise. "There will be time to figure out how this happened later. Right now, we have to focus on getting out of here together and in one piece."

"Easier said than done," Chromia noted grimly as she chanced a look over their makeshift barrier. "They're advancing."

The team of five had sneaked into Shockwaves stronghold less than a joor earlier, expecting it to be nearly deserted except for the usual guards and maybe some drones. The team consisted of Elita and Chromia, for firepower in case someone spotted them and sounded an alarm, Aqua and Vaportrail, their Special Operations members for the actual sneaking in and getting everyone to where they needed to go, and Springshift, their Chief Engineer who was to come along and examine the new device herself and determine what it was and if they could take and use it.

They came in expecting a quiet building; what they got was a small army waiting in the wings for them. It was sheer luck that they all survived the initial ambush without serious injury. At the moment, they were trapped in a large, non-descript room with their backs to the wall and the Decepticons advancing on them, protected by the portable force field from the Femmes fire. The only reason the femmes had lasted as long as they did was because Aqua had the quick thinking to throw a heavy table down and set it up as a barrier. But with the Decepticons advancing and coming around, it wouldn't be much longer before their pitiful shelter became useless.

To add insult to injury, Sprinshift's gun stopped working.

"Oh for the fragging love of Primus, don't DO this to me you glitching piece of slag!"

The engineer swore up a storm fit to turn bleach the purple walls white as she smacked her gun as hard as she could. "Don't you DARE run out of ammo on me now! Primus forsaken pit-slag of a weapon!"

Chromia gave the older green femme an incredulous look. "…It takes literally VORNS of consistent use for one of our guns to run out of energy, and you almost _never_ get in a fight. How the frag can you be out of ammo?!"

"I've been using this same gun since I joined the Contingent," Springshift explained darkly. "I used it so rarely, I never noticed how low it was actually getting even if I hardly ever actually fired it."

"Well that's just perfect!" Vaportrail shouted. "We're trapped, she's weaponless, they're coming, and no one has a fragging clue what to do next!"

"What about your phasing ability?" Aqua asked suddenly, speaking for the first time since everything started going to the Pit in a hand-basket. "Can't you phase us all through the wall or floor and get us out of here?"

Vaportrail scowled. "I've never tried to pull along anyone else with me. For all I know, if I try with you, I'll go through fine but you'll be torn apart on the molecular level, or you'll leave something important behind, or something equally painful and ugly." A thoughtful pause. "On second thought, Aqua, let's you and me give it a shot."

"Here's a better idea: come up with a better idea." Chromia 'suggested.'

"Hey Vapor, can't you use your phasing ability to just run over there and destroy their force-field generator?" Springshift asked, pausing in her smack-the-gun-until-it-works routine.

The orange femme shook her head. "It's only good for getting through solid objects. I'm still vulnerable to energy, including the weapon fire that is still blasting over our heads. Even if I made it more than three steps before getting blown to tiny bite sized pieces, I'd still be trapped on the outside of the _energy_ field."

"I'm starting to think your phasing ability is VASTLY overrated." Springshift observed dryly.

Vaportrails acidic comeback was cut of when the corner of the table blew off, and all the femmes ducked down.

"The table isn't going to be able to last much longer," Aqua noted grimly. "If we're going to do anything, we're going to have to do it soon."

"Thank you SO MUCH for the astounding information!" Vaportrail snapped.

"That's enough!" Elita said angrily. "Save it for later. If you don't have anything constructive to contribute, Vaportrail, then don't say anything at all!"

Another shot rang by that nearly took off Springshifts head.

"Oh for the love of Primus, FRAG OFF ALREADY!" she shouted at their fighters, and in a fit of temper she threw the useless gun at them.

The gun sailed through the air and bonked one of the 'Con's on the head.

Dead silence for almost a whole two seconds. Even the 'Con's stopped shooting.

"You have got to be kidding me," Aqua said flatly.

Elita shot off a couple of experimental blasts, and as usual, they were stopped by the force field.

"The field is still working," she noted. "Why did the gun itself go through unstopped?"

Springshift snapped her fingers, her optics brightening in an epiphany. "I get it now! I've been wondering why they've been able to shoot up from inside that thing. Energy is energy, there's no way they could have created a shield that'd be able to discern enemy fire from friendly fire. Take another look at them, see their guns?"

They saw their guns.

"See how the muzzles are pressed right up to the shield?" Springshift pointed out. "I bet the barrels are sticking just outside the shield. It'll stop energy and plasma, but not solids. So it'll protect them from fire, but they themselves would be able to shoot back. That's always been the problem with force fields before; sure, you'd be perfectly safe for as long as the power source lasted, but you wouldn't be able to do much of anything either except wait out the fight. These guys don't have that problem. Sure, in the field if someone dropped a bomb on them they'd be screwed with their cod pieces on, but it's not like the five of us have a grenade handy."

"So what're we supposed to do?" Vaportrail asked. "Throw our guns at them and hope they forgot to replace the generator's batteries?"

"If it's a portable generator, then it's got an incredible amount of energy trapped in a very small space, relatively speaking anyway," Springshift continued, calming down now that she had a mechanical problem to concentrate on. "One good blast, and it'll turn into a small bomb. Indoors like this, and it'll completely take out the 'Cons."

"And us!" Vaportrail nearly screeched.

"Force fields power down slowly," Springshift told her calmly. "Even with the generator destroyed, the field would linger at least another second before dissipating, enough to contain most of the blast force, maybe enough to spare us."

"Are you certain of this?" Elita pressed.

"Mostly. Even if not, it's not like we have a whole lot of options."

"You know, I really hate being the naysayer here-"

"Really Vapor? Could've fooled me." Chromia muttered.

"-BUT, even if we went through with what I think you're saying, how are we going to take out the generator? We don't even have ROCKS to throw!"

"No, but we have ourselves." Aqua said seriously.

Four pairs of optics fixed on her, widening as the implications of what she had suggested sunk in.

"No." Elita said flatly.

Aqua matched her intense look. "Ma'am, the only way for any of us to get out of this is if someone destroys their field generator. That mean's one of us is going to have to run over there, through the field, and blast the generator before we're overrun and killed or captured. It was my intelligence that got us into this mess, it should be me to make the run."

Vaportrail stared at her with an unreadable expression.

"You make the run, you won't make it half way across the floor before your gunned down." Chromia informed Agua flatly.

"The same goes for any of us." Aqua reminded her. "None of us has a better chance than the other. Except for Springshift, she'd have none whatsoever."

"Got that right." The mechanic agreed candidly.

"Actually Aqua, there is one bot here with the best chance of all," Elita said slowly.

Vaportrail, Aqua, and Springshift exchanged confused looks, wondering who among them she was referring to specifically. Chromia, knowing her commander and best friend as she did, stared at her.

"No." Chromia said flatly, echoing Elita's sentiment to Aqua's offer.

"Overruled," Elita countered. "Everyone, hold your fire. This will be hard enough avoided _their_ shots while dancing around yours as well."

"Elita, don't you dare-!"

Too late. With a flash of light that dazzled their optics, Elita was gone.

Three jaws dropped. One metal palm met metal face with a 'clank!'

"Frag it!"

oOoOoOoOo

_30 seconds left_

Elita leapt over the table barrier and ran across no-bot land as quick as she could, hampered by the shots frozen in mid air. They couldn't hit her, but they would still burn and cause damage if she touched them accidentally. If she tripped and fell on one…well, that'd certainly be an embarrassing way to die.

Down, around, over, there she was running at the field – only to crash and bounce back against it.

Of course. Freeze time, freeze space. The field couldn't let her in like this. She'd have to drop back into real time to get through.

So she did.

The look on the 'Con's face when she materialized seemingly out of nowhere was almost priceless, right up until she took one step forward into the field and punched him out. Taking advantage of the shocked surprise her appearance caused, Elita shot two more Decepticons and jumped back into time-stop mode before the others could regain their senses and shoot back.

_20 seconds left_

Hoping to distract and distress them further, she went around the thickest group, behind their backs. She dropped back into real time and fired twice, creating panic and confusion among their ranks as to what was going wrong. She yelled "Traitor!" and jumped right back into time-freeze before anyone could comprehend what she had done. Not that they would have noticed her, what with them being too focused on ferreting out the one among them who literally shot them all in the back.

_15 seconds left_

Elita whipped her head around, looking for something, anything that might be the device generating the force field.

Nothing, nothing, nothing! The time left to her was ticking away! She didn't have much time left before…oh! There it was, by the wall, right behind the one 'Con stationed to protect it.

She hurried over, dropping out of time-freeze as she did so. The guard never had a chance to even realize she was there before she fired him once in the chest, and twice at the device.

Why didn't anyone try to stop her? Because her shots were being drowned out by the Con's still trying to ferret out/catch the 'traitor.'

They were just so predictable sometimes.

No one but her noticed the high pitched, rapid beeping warning of malfunction and immediate danger. That would be her cue to leave the party and run for her life.

She ran for the field, feeling the buzz as it passed over her. The rapid beeping turned into one long whine just as she jumped back into time-freeze.

_7 seconds left_

The air was clear now of frozen shots, allowing Elita to run full out across the floor.

_3 seconds_

The table was right there! Whether it was enough cover was debatable, but it was all they had and she would NOT leave her team behind.

_1 second_

She took a flying leap over the table, tucking into a roll to land on the other side.

_Time up_

She felt rolling nausea and horrendous pain in her processor just before she landed and dropped out of time-freeze, a warning of what would have happened if she had stayed any longer.

"FIRE IN THE HOLD!" she shouted through the knives in her head.

They barely had time to duck and cover their heads before the deafening explosion and tremendous concussion wave hit them as fire and light blinded them all.

oOoOoOoOo

"And you call ME the crazy one."

"You still are. We both know I was the best choice for this. You can't complain about the results."

"You're going to push Alpha Trion to his grave, you know that, right? Soon as he hears about this, his fuel pump's going to just up and quit for good this time."

"I stayed within the thirty seconds like I promised, didn't I? Besides, what's the point in having a secret weapon if I can't use it when we need it most? If Alpha Trion didn't want me using it, he shouldn't have built it into me."

"Got me there, Elita."

"So long as everyone managed to get out alive and with all their pieces, I don't see what the big deal is about," the Contingent's orange CMO interjected as she carefully pulled out torn wires in Chromia's shoulder to replace them with new ones. "What's that expression again? 'If it's stupid but it works, it's not stupid.'"

"I wouldn't go that far Wirecrash," Vaportrail said, examining her blackened armor with distaste. She sent Elita, laying three berths away, a mild glare. "So how come you didn't tell the rest of us you had a special ability too? And how'd you get it anyway? It took my creators VORNS to find someone willing to even _try_ to upgrade me with anything useful."

"I said nothing because I didn't want to risk even the slightest chance of the Decepticons finding out about it," Elita explained as she massaged her elbows. "We need every edge we can garner, after all, and you did not absolutely need to know. As to how…let's just say there were extenuating circumstances."

Vaportrails confusion was well warranted. Specialized abilities among femmes were few and far between – not because of favoritism toward mechs in distribution, but because the workings of femme bodies were specifically designed with energy and material conservation in mind. As such, the inherent design made certain upgrades difficult and sometimes impossible, especially unusual ones. It's partly the reason why so few femmes were heavily armored, most having a leaner design that, compared to many bulky mechs, appeared downright minimalist. Vaportrail with her phasing ability was a rare exception, but that was because her Creators had the foresight to upgrade her before the war took off with something to give her an edge in escaping the fighting and the resources to go through with it.

Elita got hers because Alpha Trion could only reinforce her armor and weaponry by so much without compromising her structural integrity, so he had to get creative. The time-stop was incredibly useful and powerful, but draining and dangerous. It took a great deal of arguing before they were able to come up with a safe duration they were both happy with: 30 seconds an orn, tops. Beyond that, and she risked burning out some of her systems, and if she REALLY pushed it, she'd drain her own spark into deactivation.

Which would really defeat the purpose of upgrading her with the device for her protection.

"So…'fire in the hold?'" Chromia asked, even as Wirecrash had her hands in her shoulders up to her wrists.

"Something I picked up from Violet," Elita explained, referring to their purple-optic Demolitions expert. "It seemed appropriate."

"I'll say," Aqua said as she twiddled her fingers in front of her optics, gauging how much longer it would be before she got all her vision back. "Shockwave will spend deca-orcs repairing the damage." She sounded very pleased with this.

Aqua turned to look at the greenish-blackish blob by the wall. "Any chance of salvaging the thing, Springshift?"

Springshift, nearly completely blackened on her right side but surprisingly untouched on her left, held up a twisted mass of melted metal and frayed wires. "You mean this thing?"

"Seeing as how I can't actually see it yet, I'll take that as a 'no'."

"That's what you get for looking straight into the blast instead of ducking like everyone else." The orange medic reprimanded with no bite. She didn't even bother looking up from her work.

"Well don't." Springshift said, sounding vaguely offended that anybot might doubt her awesome mechanic skills. "Give me enough time and materials, and I just might be able to reverse engineer what's left, maybe enough to make a portable force field generator for ourselves, if I'm lucky. I'm not going to promise anything, but it'll be worth a shot."

"If you can't, then this whole mess would have been an absolute waste of time an effort." Vaportrail noted, trying in vain to rub away the soot marks that covered nearly her entire body with a rag. "Seriously, the generators busted, the old entry way's been compromised, and we all came home looking like we took a combiner team on and lost. Aside from getting Shockwave a little annoyed because we turned one of his rooms into a charcoal oven, what did we get out of this?"

"Our lives." Aqua noted dryly.

"I'll say," Wirecrash commented as she slapped Chromia's shoulder paneling back into place. "Quite frankly, you all look like slag."

The femmes quietly laughed, except for Vaportrail, who looked like the offhanded comment was causing her physical pain.

Springshift had been right; the forcefield had managed to stay up another full second even with the loss of the generator, containing most of the blast and utterly decimating the Decepticons trapped inside. It was the only thing that prevented the femmes from being destroyed right along with them. However, though it had been enough to keep the blast from becoming lethal, that didn't mean that once it was released it wasn't still a powerful force. The upturned table protected them to a degree, but only by so much.

All five femmes were sooty, dented, charred in places, with either blurry vision from the bright explosion or with a lingering ring in their audios from the blast. Their colors were almost completely hidden or scorched off, and the only defining characteristics were their voices and helms – though Chromia's was half missing and left her looking like she only had half a head.

In spite of their less than glamorous appearance, all in all they were in high spirits, still coming down from the after-battle "Oh-my-Primus-I-can't-believe-we-did/survived-that!" high. This is probably the only explanation for what happened next.

Vaportrail half turned toward Aqua, the blue femme still blinking at the fuzzy shapes around her.

"Hey, Aqua, about that suicide run you were planning, where you basically threw yourself on a sword because you screwed up?"

Everyone else tensed at the sharp words. Aqua's lips thinned. "Do not start with me again, Vapor," she said evenly, in a cold voice. "I already know I 'screwed up'. I might even know how and where I screwed up. I'm not going to let it happen again. So would you just stop it already?"

Vaportrail looked ready to snap something, but clicked her jaw shut.

"I was going to say…" she forced out instead. "…that, stupid martyr mentality aside, you volunteering like that was rather…impressive."

Aqua whipped around to about where Vaportrail was sitting. Her vision was too blurry to see her expression, but she knew the Towerling well enough to guess how hard it must have been to say that.

The spy smiled. "Thank you Vapor."

The blob she was addressing pointed to the left. "Actually I'm Wirecrash. You want the other orange femme to your left."

Elita let her head fall back as the chatter and familiar voices washed over her, tuning out the words and just hearing the harmonics. Her systems were demanding rest now, to conserve energy and give her systems a chance to recharge after the incredible energy drain.

As she off-lined her optics and drifted away, she smiled a little as someone indignantly insisted they weren't getting 'mushy' while the others laughed. She didn't care what the risks had been: when it came to her Autobots, they were worth everything.


	10. Drinking Energon

Ah-hem.

As of 1:45 Mountain Time, I, Meiza, completed my last class of my last semester of school. As of this moment, I am a University Graduate with a Major in English and Minor in Business.

I. AM. DONE!

I'm still having trouble believing it. ^_^

In celebration, I'm updating one story (Elita One, 28 Times) and starting another, (The Sum of Our Parts), inspired by a plot bunny I found on the bunny farm (which will be posted after another chapter or two, to avoid spoilers). Feel free to check that one out when you're done here!

**Meme:** Drinking Energon

**Universe:** G1, pre-war.

**Warnings:** Certain liberties taken with Dion's personality. He insisted on abusing the exclamation button.

**Summary:** Somehow or other, Dion convinces his two best friends to celebrate their upgrade into their adult molds with a trip to the best oil-house in the city – Macadams.

* * *

"I'm telling you guys, this place has the best drinks on the planet! Bot's flock here all the way from Vos just to get a sip, and it's the perfect place for celebration!"

"If this place is so spectacular, why couldn't the owner set up shot someplace a little better than Iacon's armpit?" the speakers red and blue friend muttered.

"It's probably because the 'spectacular drinks' are spiked with something illegal," his rose hued girlfriend suggested flatly.

Their orange and blue mutual friend looked back at them with a wide smile. "Ah, c'mon, don't be like that Ariel. And Orion, buddy, don't go knocking it before you try it. Trust me guys, you're going to love it! Have I ever steered you guys wrong before?"

Flat looks of 'slag yes'.

"Have I ever steered you guys wrong before on purpose?" he amended.

Orion and Ariel had to admit no.

"There you go! You know you can trust me!"

"Dion, trusting you not to so do something malicious is entirely different from trusting you not to do something stupid," Orion informed his friend in a dead pan.

Orion's and Ariel's doubts were not without reason. The pair had followed their old friend to the lower-mid levels of Iacon, sub-level six of the lower east quadrant to be exact, so far from their usual haunts that it took three t-levs just to get out here. It wasn't the worst part of the city, but it was seedy enough in its own right.

"If this is Iacon's armpit, what does that make the lowest levels?" Ariel asked curiously.

"The waste tanks." Orion answered seriously.

"Oh stop being so dramatic, this isn't exactly Kaon here." Dion reprimanded. "If it was, we'd be mugged, killed, and tossed into an ally by now for trash drones to pick up in a deca-orn or two."

"Thank you Dion, that possibility had not occurred to me until just this moment."

So why were these three young bot's braving the city sector so far from home and in dubious company? Because earlier that very orn, these three friends had gone through their final upgrade, leaving behind their youngling frames for their adult ones. It was a rite of passage that was almost sacred, leaving behind the innocence of childhood and accepting the rights and duties of an adult. Traditional celebratory customs varied from city to city by class and culture, and Dion had insisted the three of them participate in the most widespread one of all.

After all, what better way to celebrate such a momentous occasion that to get completely cratered out of their processors?

Following that line of logic, if they were going to celebrate their right to _get_ cratered for the first (legal) time, then they would do with it with the "good stuff', nay, the "Best Stuff". Evidently, the "Best Stuff" could only be found in an obscure little oil house in a section of Iacon the three of them had no rights – or sensibilities – to be in.

Naturally, Orion and Ariel had their doubts, but long experiences had taught them it was just easier to go along with Dion and let him blow off his steam that try to talk actual sense into him.

"We're here!"

Dion twirled around and raised his hands high in grand presentation. "Lady and Gentlemech, I give you the Matrix of Bars and High Grade!"

The 'Matrix' revealed itself to be a midsized, roundish building about two stories high, yet still managing to be tucked away and easy to miss by anyone who didn't know where to look. They themselves would have right past it if Dion hadn't pointed it out to them.

Then again, even if they had seen it, they would have gone right past it anyway.

It was old, rusty, dimly lit, and rundown looking on the outside, as if the owner couldn't be bothered to care about presentation. Even as they watched, a bulky mech stumbled out of the doors, swaying badly on his feet, and trotted off down the street, muttering unpleasant things as he went. Over the door was a sign glowing half-sparkedly proclaiming the building to be none other than Maccadams Old Oil House, confirming that this indeed was the place they had been searching for. Even as they watched, a dull colored mech stumbled out the doors, swaying on his feet and keeping his balance only by the grace of Primus himself, right up until he stumbled to the wall and purged up his tanks.

Nice.

Dion kept grinning as if oblivious to his friends expressions. "Well? What do you think? Pretty awesome, isn't it?"

"Words fail me," Orion said with feeling.

"Dion, are you absolutely, completely, totally, one hundred percent certain this is the place?" Ariel asked, fixated on a discoloration on the out wall of unknown and possible unsavory origin.

"Of course I am!" Dion said exuberantly, never losing his grin. "I heard about it from a reliable source!"

"Who?"

"Eh, some mech I met a party one time. He gave me great directions, even drew a little map for me. Granted, we were both a little charged at the time, and this is my first time here, but I defiantly remember he mentioned Macadams, and this is the only Macadams I've seen ever!"

Orion and Ariel exchanged looks and a silent message of "what have we gotten ourselves into?"

"Dion, this is a bad idea." Orion tried to reason. "Maybe we should just head home, I'm sure you know of a few good places where-"

"Nonsense!" Dion insisted. He leaned forward and grabbed an arm each from Orion and Ariel, pulling them forward towards the building. "We've already come all this way, we might as well enjoy the fruits of our labor? Besides, what's the worst that can happen?"

Again with the exchanged looks, but this time with a sense of heavy resignation usually reserved for prisoners heading to their execution.

"Alright Dion, you win," Ariel said wearily. "But if anyone grabs my aft I'm kicking yours."

"Fair enough."

oOoOoOoOoOo

The owner could have been forgiven the rather dismal first impression the store front gave if he had renovated the interior to be bright, airy, clean and welcoming with engaging floor design and smiling staff to greet them as a reward for anyone who gave the establishment a chance.

He didn't.

If nothing else, the owner was consistent with his presentation. The insides was dimly lit, with a low ceiling and dun colored walls and the occasional painting of random subject and hanging, as if someone had tried to spruce up the place and had no idea how to go about it. Several tables were scattered haphazardly as if the owner didn't care where they went, so long as they were inside. Most of those tables had at least a couple of patrons nursing their drinks, and one table was dominated by a trine of obnoxiously loud lavender Seekers celebrating something or other, it was hard to tell through the drunken revelry. A harpsichord was playing itself in the back (drone? Machine? Weird transformer?), lightening the overall atmosphere with its music. At the bar itself they could see a massive scowling mech cleaning empty cubes and glasses with a rag.

At least nothing was broken, though Ariel had doubts about one chair's ability to hold its massive occupant for much longer.

Friends in tow, Dion marched straight up to the bar with a grin fit to split his face in half. Finally releasing his hands, he slapped both his palms down on the counter in a fashion he probably saw too many times on the holo-vids.

"Bartender!" he said loudly, with cheer that seemed jarring out of place. "A round of your best high-grade! We're celebrating!"

The bartenders hands never stopped, but his optics flickered up to Dion for a brief second before flickering over to Orion and Ariel. When he saw them, his optics narrowed ever so slightly. Just like that, it was as someone had dropped a neutron star on the room, the gaze was just so heavy and inescapable.

Ariel couldn't put her finger on it, but there was something about this mech that was creeping her out, and not just because he was looking at them as if he had completely forgotten Dion. Or rather, he paid a bit of attention to Ariel, but focused with laser like intensity on Orion, and he didn't like what he was seeing. It was an intensity of such gravity, it made the entire world tunnel until there was nothing else. Ariel almost took a step back. Orion even put an arm half up protectively in front of her, more by instinct than choice.

"So long as you can pay, you can stay. But I won't tolerate any trouble here," he said in a deep, gravelly voice. "This is not a place for scores or fights. I don't give a frag what you do once you leave, but provoking is strictly banned inside. Try and start anything, and I'll throw the lot of you out."

He might have meant the group, he might have been answering Dion, but he never broke optic contact with Orion.

Ariel felt a chill down her spinal strut, and stood a little closer to her boyfriend.

Dion was wholly oblivious.

"No problem! We know how to behave properly, don't we?"

"Y-yeah, right." Orion agreed, the slight waver betraying how freaked how he was getting with the bartender just staring at him.

A long, long moment as the bartender appraised them.

"Just wait a moment, then." He said at last, turning away to put the cube and rag aside. All at once, Ariel fell like she had gone from being sucked into the crushing power of a black hole to the liberating freedom of deep space on a sling shot. She hadn't realized how unnerving the bartender was getting until he had finally turned away.

_What was __that__ about?_ She wondered, even as her spark kept anxiously fluttering.

"So like I said before, we need three cubes of your best high grade!" Dion told the bartenders back. Ariel snapped back to reality.

"Make that two," she said quickly, coming around Orion. "I'll just have oil."

"A-ri-el! We're here to _celebrate_!" Dion protested, drawing out her name and looking like the femme had personally wounded him.

She rolled her optics at his theatrics. "Believe it or not, Dion, SOMEONE needs to stay sober to make sure we all make it back home again in one piece, and quite frankly, I'd rather not get 'cratered' in a place like this. Ah, no offense intended," she added hastily to the bartender.

"None taken," he said, and if anything he looked amused. "Just shows you're a young femme with a good head on your shoulders. Wish there were more like you out there."

Ariel smiled slightly. Now that he wasn't staring at them, the bartender wasn't nearly as intimidating as she thought – he just had a powerful presence. The glaring thing was probably something he did with everyone to enhance his 'no-violence' warning. Not that he didn't look fully capable of going through with his threat of literally throwing them all out on their afts.

She, Orion, and Dion carefully counted out the payment as the bartender prepared their order. As soon as they money was on the counter, two cubes and a dull grey cup appeared before them.

The three friends stared.

The cup looked like a non-descript but safe serving of oil. The high grade, on the other hand, were shifting shades of lavender and purple that were practically humming with contained energy. Even as they watched, occasional bright bolts of mini-lightening would dance across the cube walls. It was like looking into a rolling purple electric storm someone had managed to trap in a box.

"…This isn't…food." Orion noted.

"Don't knock it just yet, youngling," the bartender said briskly but with no bite, already back to cleaning the used cubes. "Your friend wanted the best, I gave you the best. You don't want it, it's your loss."

"Of experience?"

"Of credits."

In one smooth motion the bartender scooped up the deposited credits and dropped them into his sub-space.

"Hey!" Orion protested.

His protest died a quick and violent death under the Glare.

"Never mind," he amended quietly.

The trio took their drinks and managed to secure a table to themselves, as far from the still-obnoxiously loud Seeker trine as possible. They stared at the high grade, all of them, even the inordinately optimistic Dion, privately wondering just how safe it was.

"Dion, you go first." Orion ordered bluntly.

"Hey, buddy, I appreciate the thought, but since you're my best friend, I'll let you have the first honors!"

"My friend, I would rather chew off my leg and use it as a pogo-stick than try that stuff untested."

Ariel tried to cover up her laugh but turned it into a snort.

"Alright, fine, if you're going to be such a pussy about it…"

With much aplomb Dion took his cube and brought it to his lips for a full swig to down the whole cube in one gulp. Fortunately, common sense prevailed at the last second, and instead he took just a mouthful.

"WHOA!"

Orion and Ariel were already half out of their seats as Dion jolted and stiffened in this seat, optics flashing brightly as his entire body trembled minutely.

"Dion! Are you alright??"

"Whoa…whoa…that's…whoa…"

"Orion, call the hospital! The surges shorted out his CPU! I think he's about to go into stasis lock!!"

Dion rapidly shook his head clear.

"What? No no no, relax!" he said quickly, optics dimming to their normal glow. But now he was looking at his cube with almost reverential awe.

"Ariel, you have got to try at least one sip of this stuff! It's just…it's just…Primus, I can't even describe it! Are my denta glowing? I feel like my denta should be glowing. Frag, my entire mouth feels charged. I'm still tingly all over, that's how awesome this stuff is."

"After just one sip?"Orion asked, looking at his own untouched cube like it was a bubbling acid bomb.

"Well, obviously this stuff needs to be savored slowly. But Primus guys, when they talk about the Good Stuff, this is what they're talking about! Go on, try it!"

Orion was still hesitant, but since Dion hadn't died yet ye figured the high grade was moderately safe after all. But just to be safe, Ariel kept poised to call the hospital while he took his first experimental sip.

Orion's optics flared a bright azure in astonishment as the energon hit. "Oh wow.

Dion was grinning like a mad mech now.

"See? See? Ariel, your turn!"

"I'll pass," the pink femme said, lifting up her cup of oil. "I know you. I let you talk me into one sip, you'll have me taking a few dozen, which will completely defeat the purpose of me being the sober one here. I'll stick with my oil, thanks."

"You're no fun."

"Say that again when I'm getting your cratered aft back to the t-levs in one piece," she responded, before taking a sip.

She didn't jolt with an energy surge, and her optics didn't flash from a burst, but they did widen in astonishment as she discovered the taste.

She had been expecting regular oil, something to fill her up while the mechs had their high grade. But when Dion had asked for a round of the "best," the bartender took his order seriously, and he delivered as well with his oil as he did with the high grade. The oil was smooth, rich, and flavorful, with a hint of sweet rust and mercury for body, coming together for a beverage that was rich, delicious, and nutritious.

So THIS is where all the renovation money went!

"Wow."

Dion grinned smugly, leaning back in his seat and holding up his storm-in-a-cube as if in toast. "And to think you guys doubted me. Was it worth it, or was it worth it?"

Orion and Ariel exchanged looks. Dion would never let them live this down, but there was no denying that this was one of their friends better ideas.

"Alright Dion, yes, this was a good idea." Orion admitted with a sly grin. "And since it was your idea, you get to buy the next round."

"What?!"

The dating couple shared a good laugh over Dion's stricken expression.

They stayed for another couple of rounds, Ariel sticking to her oil as promised (not that she was tempted to get anything else because, because _Primus_ that stuff was good!). The buzz relaxed the young mechs and they became more and more talkative and animated, and their happy mood bled into Ariel so that she couldn't help but share in their festive feelings and relax right along with them. They spent joors at that table, talking and laughing about anything and everything. Ariel would never remember exactly what they talked about or why it was all so funny, but she would remember this as one of the best night of her life.

Well, most of it anyway.

"And then, and then, he kicked him in the face!" Dion finished loudly, laughing as if he just told the funniest joke in the world, rather than a disjointed anecdote that sounded like a mishmash of four or five other stories Ariel was vaguely familiar with. Orion chuckled right along, sober enough to realize he had no idea what was so funny but too charged to really care.

Ariel, the last remaining voice of reason, decided enough was enough.

"Okay then," she said slowly, gathering up the empty cubes. "I think you guys have had enough. How about we call it a night before someone passes out from surges?"

"Wha? Nuh uh!" Dion protested. "I'm, I'm still good, I c'n hold m' grade, right Orion buddy?"

"Uh what?" Orion asked in a daze, torn away from his self musings. Orion was many things, but Ariel knew that a mech able to hold his high grade was not one of them.

She quirked an optic ridge at the less than stellar response. "Right. Yeah, you're both about done."

"Just, just one more round Ariel, promise!" Dion pleaded. "Then I'll go nice and quiet, on m' honor! I'll, I'll even pay for it myself!"

Ariel opened her mouth to argue, but changed her mind. She wasn't sure about getting more drinks, but again, this was Dion and most times it was easier to just go along than to try and talk him out of anything, charged or sober. Orion, she knew, would follow her direction easily and willingly. But Dion? Not so much. Besides, he was still talking in mostly complete sentences and could hold extended optic contact, so one more couldn't possibly hurt. And if nothing else, Dion was always as good as his word.

"Alright, one more for you," Ariel conceded, standing up. "You stay here, I'll get it. You can pay me back in the morning."

"You're such a sweetie, Ariel!" Dion gushed with a love-struck smile. "Orion, he's such a lucky guy t' have you."

"Watch it Dion," the named friend said suddenly, snapping back to clarity just long enough to deliver the dire warning.

Rolling her optics at the slight possessive display, but secretly still thinking it was kind of sweet that Orion could still jump to 'defend her honor' even when he could barely keep his optics focused in front of him, she turned and headed for the bar to get the last drink of the evening. As a precaution she took her oil with her, because in his state she didn't trust Dion not to accidently knock it over or knock it back, thinking it was more high grade.

As she passed one of the tables, the big mech she had observed earlier when she first came in chose that moment to push his chair back and get up. He was easily two heads taller than Ariel, and at least three times her mass. So when his shoulder hit her at a glancing blow, the force was enough to send the unprepared femme stumbling backwards, her drink spilling as she tried and failed to catch her balance.

Before she could lose the fight with gravity, the navy blue mech that nearly knocked her down shot his hands out to grab her. One huge hand landed on her shoulder, the other haphazardly around her little waist.

"Oh Primus, I'm so sorry!" He apologized quickly as he helped steady her back on her feet. The hand stayed on her shoulder, but he was quick to remove the one on her waist.

"You're not hurt, are you?" he asked in sincere concern. "I'm really sorry about that, I didn't see you there."

"No, no, it's alright, I'm fine, thank you," Ariel assured him with a smile. What a gentlemech!

"HEY!"

Ariel and the mech looked to see the infuriated orange truck standing over his table, shooting daggers at the blue mech behind the femme.

Unfortunately, Dion had seen the exchange, and between the energon goggles and his own impulsive nature, he got an entirely different perspective.

"You! Get Away from Ariel, you pervert!" he shouted.

"Pervert?!" the blue mech exclaimed in disgust. "What the frag are you talking about? I haven't done anything to your friend!"

"Dion, he hasn't-" Ariel tried to say, but was quickly drowned out.

"HA! Don't pretend to act all innocent! I saw everything! Now step away from her before I kick your aft!" Dion loudly proclaimed, coming around the table. Orion lifted his head and looked at his friend in confusion.

"What? What did who do?" He asked.

"That guy hit Ariel and tried to grab her aft!"

"He WHAT!"

Ariel slapped her hand over her optics as her "drunk avenger" count doubled.

"Dion, Orion, calm down, his hand was nowhere near-"

Again she was cut off, this time by Orion swinging her around so she was behind the Great Wall of Dion and Orion, with the increasingly annoyed Blue Mech on the other side.

"Look, you're both charged," Blue Mech tried, making a visible effort to keep calm. "You're overreacting. I didn't do anything, your girlfriend knows I didn't do anything. So both of you calm down before we start something we're all going to regret."

"Bet you'd like that, huh?" Orion challenged, bringing his fists up to bear. "Trying to run away, coward? We're not going to let you off that easily!"

"Yeah. YOU leave, you freak, before we MAKE you!" Dion added, shoving Blue Mech in the chest as hard as he could. He almost made him move an inch.

"Don't you touch me!" Blue Mech warned, pushing Dion back off of him. But with him being so much larger, his push sent Dion stumbling back two steps.

It was like someone flipped a switch. Dion was immediately on the offensive, jumping on top of Big Mech with a full body roar. Orion was right behind him, coming around behind Blue Mech and helping Dion overwhelm the much larger and now fully infuriated mech while Ariel yelled at them both to _stop it already_!

A mountain loomed over all of them, and a heavy thunder rolled over them all.

"I believe I was quite clear about the rules," the thunder intoned.

Blue Mech was big. The bartender was bigger.

The bartender grabbed Blue Mech and Dion by the backs of their necks, bodily dragged them both to the door like sacks of bearings, and tossed them one after another onto the street. Orion and Ariel had followed out of concern and curiosity, and for his effort Orion was swiftly grabbed up and tossed outside as well, nearly landing right on top of Dion.

"If you're going to fight, take it outside." The bartender reminded them, before retreating back into the building. Ariel, standing just outside the doorway, moved aside to let him past, optics wide in astonishment at the incredible display of strength.

Well, now she knew why the owner never bothered to hire a bouncer.

Arial watched the trio untangle themselves with a flat expression, one hand on her jutted hip, the other still holding her cup. The Blue Mech managed to disentangle himself, muttered an apology to Ariel (which she acknowledged with a nod) before leaving down the street. Dion sat up and was holding his head, although whether the processor ache was from the high-grade or having a mech twice his size dropped on top of him, no one would be able to tell. Orion, flat on his back and looking content to stay there, craned his neck to look at the pink femme upside down.

"Don't worry, Ariel, I'm okay," he said with a little smile. "I'm just glad we were able to chase that guy off. Next time he'll think twice before he tries to get frisky with someone else's girl."

"Really. That's just _great_, sweetspark, because random acts of violence and bar fights do WONDERS for protection! Primus forbid the two of you ever think twice before getting in a fist fight with someone nearly twice you size for no reason."

"Hey, we had a fragging good reason, I'll have you know!" Dion protested.

"Yes, because in your totally cratered state you thought some mech was getting too 'frisky' with me. Maybe we should come up with hand signals so I let you guys know when I actually need 'rescuing'. How about this?"

Ariel made a rather obscene gesture with her free hand.

"That was a little uncalled for." Orion said quietly. Ariel almost felt bad. Almost.

"Deal with it. You're both so cratered, neither of you are going to remember to be offended in the morning," she snapped.

Dion started to say something, but Ariel held her hand up to stop him. "No, don't even start Dion, I'm tired of you both right now. Both of you listen to me. This is what is going to happen."

She held up her cup.

"I am going back inside. I am going to finish my drink. When I am done, I will come out here again. If I'm feeling charitable, and if you both managed to stay out of trouble for the next five breens or so, I might be willing to help you guys get back home in one piece. Until then, LEAVE ME ALONE!"

Orion and Dion flinched. A couple of bystanders clapped. Ariel ignored them both, turning on her heel and striding back inside, mutteringly darkly about "stupid macho mechs with glitched out CPU's who think I need protecting from every little thing because I'm a femme".

"I take it this has happened before?" The bartender asked/guessed as the pink femme took a seat at the bar, chuckling a little as he spoke.

"They've always been a bit protective of me, even growing up. The drunken bar fight is new though." She admitted. She put the cup to her lips and tilted back for a sip. Then tilted more. Then a little more. Confused, she pulled the cup away and peered in, only to groan in discovery. Sure enough, when she had stumbled after bumping into Blue Mech, she had spilled the last of her drink.

What was she supposed to do _now_??

Clunk.

Ariel started slightly as a full cup materialized in front of her.

"On the house." The bartender informed her. "You're going to need it if you're going to be the one to get Dumb and Dumber back home."

Ariel smiled at the little show of kindness. "Thank you," she said sincerely. "And I'm sorry about the mess they made. They're not normally like that."

"I'll take your word for it," the bartender promised, going back to polishing (didn't he ever run out of cubes?). "But didn't you say they were usually protective of you?"

"Pretty much all the time, yeah," she answered, taking and savoring a sip of oil. "Normally I think it's kind of sweet, and let's face it, what femme doesn't feel better knowing she's got two strong mechs ready to defend her in a bad neighborhood? I just wish they'd back off a little sometimes. I'm not made of crystal; I don't need constant protection, thank you very much!"

The bartender listened in silence, hands continuously moving from cube to cube, as he let the femme rant between sips a little on her well-meaning if occasionally idiotic friend/boyfriend. The hardest part was keeping a straight face though the whole diatribe when her vocabulary became especially creative.

"Sometimes I think I need to punch someone out just to show them how not-helpless I really am," she finished with a grumble. "See how they think of _that_."

The bartender grinned as Ariel took a long sip as if in toast. His hands never stopped, but he watched her out of the corner of his optic for a long, appraising moment, and carefully weighed what he was about to say. Ariel never noticed until he set the cubes down and leaned down against the bar, prompting her to lower her nearly empty cup and give him her full attention.

"Now you listen to me," he began seriously. "I already told you you've got a good head on your shoulders, which is a lot more important than all the misguided good intentions in the world. It's not going to be much longer until you're the one doing the protecting."

Ariel snorted. "Yeah, by bailing them out of jail some day because Dion had such a great idea and Orion is too good a friend to let him do it alone."

The bartender shook his head. "No, that's not what I'm talking about."

Ariel quirked up an inquisitive brow. But curiosity would turn into slight apprehension as he leaned down a little further and lowered his voice for her and her alone, as if what he was about to tell her, could not be allowed to leave this room.

"Right now, you're the voice of reason to Dion's brashness and Orion's caution. It keeps the three of you balanced, connected. But it won't be like that forever. Pretty soon, you're going to become the rock he can lean on, the anchor that reminds him of what's most important."

There it was again, the incredible _weight_ from before, and Ariel was helpless to move or speak or think, not so much because she couldn't, but because she was just so compelled to _listen_ to that deep, gravelly voice that was so, so old, though she had no way of knowing this beyond a shivering feeling on the back of her neck.

" You're going to have to remind him of the things that are worth fighting for, because without someone like you, to remind him of who he really is, of where he came from and where he hopes to go, he'll just be stripped away layer by layer until there is nothing left. He won't be able to help it, it's in his nature to give it his all, but he'll need someone to help him pull it all back together again."

He straightened a little, taking the weight with him. This time, there was no sense of relief or freedom to follow, just a cold sense of dread that she had just heard something touching on a future that would come no matter what she did to stop it.

Ariel tried to laugh off her nervousness. Even to her own audio's it sounded fake.

"You make it sound like we're about to go off on some grand adventure from a B-rated holovid," she joked. "You don't have to sound so _serious_ about it."

The bartender shrugged.

"You're still young. Still innocent. You'd best enjoy it while it lasts."

"Not that young," Ariel muttered quietly. She tilted her cup back for the last little sip, then set the cup down. She thanked the bartender for the drink, slid off her seat, and made a beeline for the door. It was late, and they needed to get home before the t-levs…

Wait.

Against better judgement and common sense, she stopped and half turned to look back at the bartender.

"'_His_ rock?' Not '_their_' rock?"

He didn't even bother looking up.

"You'd better get your friends before they wander off and fall off the walkway," he warned.

Ariel hovered there for a second or two longer, a question on the tip of her tongue. She opened her mouth…and closed it again. Instead, she turned and left for the door. S was still a little mad at them, but she was suffering a bad case of the willies and she really wanted to give her mechs a hug right now and never let go.

The young femme would remember many details of this night, the good, the bad, and the annoying-yet-funny-with-time-and-distance. But even though she had spend nearly ten minutes speaking to the bartender, she would never, ever be able to clearly recall the details of his face, his build, or even the color of the optics she had looked straight into.

oOoOoOo

Macadam watched the pink slip of a femme move around the tables as she walked away. Time and History would have their claws on her and her friends soon enough, that much he knew. The ancient mech knew there were few constants in the universes.

Optimus Prime was one. So was Megatron.

Elita One would be another.

No matter how many versions he saw, he still couldn't help but feel a small spark of pity for the young femme, mature for her friends, but still young and silly compared to the femme she would become. The universe would have its constants. That didn't necessarily mean that this one, this version in particular, whose importance and contribution were so often overlooked and ignored by the giants around her, was ready for it.

Almost to the door, Ariel found her path suddenly blocked by the large lavender Seeker with a lecherous grin and leaning torso. Macadam couldn't hear what he was saying, but from the enthused cheering of his trine mates and the Seekers own body language, it wasn't too hard to guess.

The femme shook her head firmly, and moved to go around him. The Seeker, undeterred, wrapped a hand around her waist.

Without the slightest hesitation Ariel's hand shot straight up with a CRACK! as the heel of her palm met the Seekers chin with enough force to snap his head back. The Seeker stumbled backwards, tripping over his own feet and landing painfully on his sensitive wings while his trine mates howled in laughter at his lack of luck. Ariel ignored them all and let the door swing shut behind her, as calm as if the interruption never happened.

Macadam chuckled as the unlucky Seeker pulled himself back up, rubbing his jaw and looking utterly lost as to what just happened. Technically she had broken his 'no fights inside' rule, but seeing as she had already left and had given the Seeker due warning, he could let it slide.

_Oh yeah, _he thought with a secretive grin_. She's going to be just fine._


	11. Greedy

**Meme:** Greedy

**Universe:** Pre-movie, and pre-TPWIP, so no familiarity required. Sequel to "Dominant."

**Warnings:** One-sided MegxElita, because this pairing jumped into my head and wouldn't let go. What can I say? I have a fascination with a dark Romeo and Juliet. If it's not your cup of tea, light as it is, feel free to not read.

You're going to come across reference to a mech named "Gigatron." He's completely made up. I just needed a name for the LHP preceding Megatron, and "Galvatron" would have been too confusing.

**Summary:** Megatron contemplates his former instructor, and finds himself "intrigued" by her hidden faces.

Orn: 1 day

Deca-orn: 1 week

Vorn: 1 year

* * *

Megatron did not give respect lightly, mostly because he rarely found anyone worth giving it too. It seemed like he was constantly surrounded by either sycophants seeking to ally themselves with a powerful mech as early as possible, or older mechs who looked down on him and his brother with condescension for their inexperience or with greed for what they will become, neither group being the least bit worthy of either his time or tolerance, let alone his respect. The only reason some of them even _had_ his time was because they were his instructors (because as aggravating and distasteful as some of them where, they were fragging good at what they did). He'll give his respect grudgingly when talent and intelligence is demonstrated, even if he hated them personally, but genuine respect? He could count on one hand how many others he's gifted with it. It was about to get smaller, because as of late Sentinel Prime's repetitious preaching's of his future duty and responsibilities as both Protector and figurehead has been grating on his nerves, and even Gigatron had been becoming progressively weaker in comparison to himself, and how can he respect a warrior and fighter weaker than he is?

This is probably why Elita One had intrigued him so much from the get-go.

Even though she had been clearly frightened (which pleased him, because she had been one of the few to recognize and respect the power he held from the beginning, rather than having needed to be 'taught'), she had not resorted to flattery or kow-towing. Instead, she kept her head high and directly challenged him. When she gave him the freedom to dismiss her, she effectively took power away from him and took it for herself, by removing the threat and taking it in stride. He still didn't fully believe she had as much to offer as she advertised, but he had been willing to see where it would take them, and how long she would really last. He decided to be generous and guessed high: four orns tops.

Needless to say, she lasted much longer.

Every backhanded insult, cutting remark, veiled insult, undercutting attempt, and psychological attack that had left all the others trembling, shaken, and confused as to which way was up, she countered, answered, and deflected with speed and grace, never once losing her polite, formal tone that somehow still managed to convey as sense of warmth and even amusement. Megatron's had to respect her wit and intelligence, and he had to admit (only to himself) that he…enjoyed their little verbal fests.

Beyond the occasional borderline-snark fests, to his surprise the lessons weren't what he expected either: exactly as she had promised.

They weren't just lessons of persuasion and public speaking: they were lessons in history, psychology, government, culture, and debate all rolled into one. Elita would set up discussions and debates between the three of them, herself changing position as needed and even personalities, from the intelligent rational persona, to the unmovable militant, to the humorously hysterical extremist convinced the world would end if they did not take action RIGHT NOW. Instead of feeling annoyed with the tactic or finding it childish, he found it refreshing and engaging, a way to practice and apply what he was learning, and it wasn't unusual for the lessons to go over the time limit because all three of them had become so wrapped up in faux debates they lost all track of time. One of her favorite techniques was to have them argue for the opposite position, just to make sure they understood the entire issue and why they held the positions they did.

_("We can't ignore the Gratorin's Civil war, Prime. They're massacuring their own people, and we're the only world with the power and resources to intercede and stop them from their own genocide. We need to reach out to their leaders and broker a peace, or at least a cease-fire. Failing that, Optimus, it's our moral obligation to help those refugee's caught in the cross fire."_

"_You're right Megatron, we can't ignore the war; whoever wins will affect our own interests in that region. But us going in only as 'diplomats' and 'peacekeepers' will be completely ineffective. When that fails, it'll make us look weak and ineffective. If we're going to involve ourselves, we can't be half-sparked about it. Megatron, the only way to protect our interests is to go in at full military strength and sure the right side wins."_

"…_This is quite possibly the most surreal moment of my life, gentlemechs.")_

Phase Out, the instructor after Elita, was starting to get really tired of coming down every few orns to remind them all that yes, they DO have another lesson after hers, so would they _please_ wrap it up already before they ate up any more of his time?

More than that, she was consistent. The face she showed them during the lesson was the same face she showed everyone else (except when she was working – she joked she had a dozen different faces depending on who she was talking to and what she wanted, and Megatron suspected she hadn't been exaggerating by much).

In short, Instructor Elita was making it really, really hard for Megatron to only have a strictly "grudging" respect for her.

But there was something else, something subtle that had been niggling in the back of his mind about her, and it wasn't until nearly half a vorn in that he realized what it was – and then he was ready to kick himself for not noticing earlier.

Elita was strongly principled, intelligent, quick-witted, disarming, polite always, patient, and charming. But interwoven in the faux debates and casual discussions, he could see a streak of sharp cunning, ruthlessness, and a cold operative that would not hesitate to use more insidious methods to get what she wanted, one willing to step on whoever she had to in order to further her agenda. She was a powerful ally, and could prove herself a dangerous enemy.

Megatron checked the records, and wasn't terribly surprised to find that the senators and business mechs who double-crossed or disregarded her found themselves being shoved aside or having their agenda's suddenly disappear, until they threw their support into an issue Elita herself just so happened to be behind. Then, all of a sudden, the political quagmire they had been trapped in would miraculously evaporate.

What an intriguing series of coincidences.

_("You know, you're not nearly as nice as you pretend to be Elita."_

"_Hm?"_

"_I've noticed a pattern regarding what happens to anyone who crosses you. I never would have guessed you could be so ruthless."_

"_Well, I do not appreciate others trying to force my hand or twist my agendas to further their own goals. 'Compromise' can be more harm than good sometimes, more-so when you allow yourself to lose your power or for your original goals to be warped and lost in the process. 'Compromise' is well and good in it's proper place, but it is not always the best solution. Consider that your lesson of the day.")_

That hidden face of hers fascinated him. More so because Optimus, who was usually better at picking up the subtleties and nuances of character, seemed oblivious to their shared instructors darker side. It left him wanting to see more of it, see what other faces she kept hidden from everyone else.

So he started seeking her out outside of lessons. Not every orn, of course, just occasionally bumping into her in the halls, or chancing upon her in a rare free moment of time, striking up casual conversation about, anything really. They didn't just have philosophical discussions of politics and history, but also about arts, literature, experiences, and mechs they knew…they talked about anything and everything, likes, dislikes, what they've done, what they hoped to do. In the process Megatron learned more and more about the red colored femme, and while they didn't always agree, she defended her views with intelligence and made him think about his own.

She never ceased to be fascinating to him. With all their talks, they were relaxed and could banter and joke back and forth, and no matter how often she lightly teased him (something that – literally – no one else but Optimus had been allowed to get away with), he never found himself the least bit annoyed, only genuinely amused.

It didn't escape his notice how her optics would light up for him in a way they didn't for anyone else, or how she always seemed to have just the right amount of free time available to talk, or that she was never too busy to take a break from what she was doing even for just a little while. It gave him an odd sense of..._satisfaction_, dare he say _pleasure_.

When he and Optimus fully inherited their roles as Prime and Lord High Protector at the long awaited Ascension Ceremony, she had been right there alongside Ironhide and his bondmate Chromia, looking prouder than he had ever seen her as she saw them in their final forms for the first time. In his huge new form, Megatron felt incredible power and strength, a sensation he relished for as long as he could, a sensation that nearly doubled when Elita came over and he saw just how much he towered over her now, how that, when she offered a handshake, his hand completely swallowed hers, her hand just slightly bigger than his palm.

She was no longer the authority figure, and while she wasn't exactly an 'equal', she was closer to being one in his optics than anyone else aside from his brother. Even though her services as their instructor were no longer needed, she stayed around with her work, and to his pleasure the conversations did not stop. They didn't happen as often as they used to – the realities of their duties saw to that – but they didn't stop. For which, Megatron was grateful. And why not?

She was intelligent.

She was strong-willed.

She was a little mysterious.

She was respectful, but never subservient.

And, she was very, very beautiful.

The last realization came a mere few deca-orns after the Ceremony, and startled Megaton so badly he actually crashed into a wall before he could catch himself. He practically had to flee to his quarters as fast as dignity would allow, avoiding Optimus' concern and the embarrassing questions that would have been sure to follow.

To his unmitigated shock, somehow or other his young Instructor had become…"special" to him in a way he hadn't anticipated, in a way no one else has. He wouldn't say she had become more "special" than his brother was to him, but she had become important in a completely different way.

He had a feeling he knew what word Optimus would have used to describe it, but Primus forbid Megatron used it himself!

Still, now that he thought about it, it explained several things. Such as why seeing Elita speaking to other mechs in a friendly manner at first never bothered him, then became annoying, and then almost started to anger him that she could derive _enjoyment_ from being with someone else. He was the Lord High Protector! Why would she every possibly deign to grant a lesser mech even a scrap of her attention outside of her work and duties? It got so bad he would become sorely tempted to just attack them on the spot if he saw it, especially if they had the blind luck of making Elita laugh.

But the only thing that would upset him more than seeing Elita enjoying herself with another mech not worthy of her attentions, he later discovered, was seeing Elita being insulted or berated by one – such as when Phase Out became jealous that Elita continued to "monopolize" their time even after her services were "obsolete".

Had he known Megatron was within hearing distance, he might not have spoken so freely of his grievances.

_("You're just a go-between for snooty spoiled Tower mechs and the politicians. You're so far down the ladder you're barely even on it. Just what gives you the right to even be in the same room as the Prime or the Lord High Protector?"_

"_I will not bother to justify my job to you, though I commend you ability to present such an honest evaluation of your own peers. Your family is one of the oldest lines living it the Towers, yes?"_

"_That's beside the point! You were brought in as a rhetoric instructor only. You did your job adequately, I'll give you that. Now you're just leeching off of them! What, you think you're so special because those two still fancy you?"_

"_If either one of them did not wish to continue association with me, they are certainly free to say so. Primus knows Megatron would not hesitate to say as much, and even if Optimus were too polite to say anything, Ironhide would happily tell me off instead."_

"_That, we can agree on. But I think we both know why neither of them has said anything."_

"_Because they consider me a friend and I do not abuse my friendship with them to get what I want?"_

"_Hardly. Tell me Elita, when they were still your students, which one did you seduce first?"_

"…_.I _beg your pardon_?"_

"_It was Optimus, right? He'd have been easier, and he was always the more naïve of the two. How long did Megatron take? I bet you had to work extra hard to get him into your berth."_

"_You are sick and perverted, Phase Out, to even entertain the idea that I would ever try such a thing with my own students!"_

"_They were practically still younglings, young and inexperienced, and the only instructor they ever took a shine to was the young, pretty femme who hoarded their time and attention. Don't think I'm the only one who's connected the dots, Elita. For someone who's supposed to be so smart, you are embarrassingly obvious about it."_

"_I will not dignify that with a response. Get away from me Phase Out, and do not speak to me ever again.")_

Fortunately she didn't have to tolerate him for long. Shortly thereafter Phase Out had mysteriously and suddenly transferred to another tower for an indefinite amount of time, or so everyone assumed.

Come to think of it, it had been nearly an entire vorn now. Megatron should probably check up on him, just to make sure he was still alive.

Or perhaps not.

In any case, once Megatron finally realized the probable implications of his…possessive defensiveness of the red femme (and recovered from smashing himself into a wall – again), he did the logical, mature thing any intelligent and able-minded mech would have done in a similar situation – avoid the problem (Elita) like cosmic rust.

He was Lord High Protector, he couldn't afford to be weakened with unnecessary ties and frivolous emotions! He had hoped that cutting down his interactions with the femme would be enough to starve the infatuation, and he'd be able to go about his life as normal again.

Except instead of dampening the infatuation he found himself…_missing_ her, Primus frag it! And the more he _missed_, her the more the _thought_ about her, which _completely_ defeated the purpose of avoiding her in the first place!

The dreams she suddenly started starring in weren't helping either.

Instead, the infatuation was getting worse – now, just seeing her talk to any mech not himself, seeing her _smile_ at any mech other than himself, was enough to infuriate him. The last time, he had been halfway down the hall ready to pull Elita away from the audacious mech and send him flying through the window for daring to _speak_ to her, before he had been able to catch himself.

And whenever he thought of the possibility of her becoming involved with one…

Suffice to say, it had been a VERY bad day for the battle drones while he worked off his aggression.

Well, avoiding her wasn't working, and the infatuation wasn't going away, but he couldn't let it keep affecting him like this, and if he had to keep watching her with other mechs, he thought he might very well go crazy. At this rate, the only way he was ever going to have any peace of mind would be to lock her in a room where no one could see her!

Megatron actually stopped mid step at that thought.

No, he wasn't actually going to lock her up – he wasn't that crass – but there was another solution that he honestly hadn't realized before.

She was a talented negotiator and diplomat, able to argue, cajole, or strong arm just about anyone to get what she wanted. She would be a powerful ally, so there was the practical application.

He could admit he had been intellectually attracted to her almost from the beginning, and she was a refreshing change from the boot lickers and cowards he normally dealt with on a daily basis.

Relatively more recently, he had to admit to himself that he was physically attracted to her as well. No surprise really, she was quite beautiful and graceful, and the dreams didn't exactly leave much room for doubt or denial. Just remembering the dreams, the images of Elita panting, arching, gasping beneath him, was enough to get his systems running hot again (which is why he tried very hard to only remember them in the privacy of his quarters).

In any case, if the problem was that he couldn't stand to share any of Elita's time or attention, then he simply had to take her for himself. After that, it wouldn't matter who she worked with or talked to, he would be assured of her faithfulness and loyalty to himself and himself alone, that he alone would be the center of her world, and would forever remain that way.

He already wanted her. He might as well have her.

He had no doubt she would welcome his courtship. He was one of the most powerful mechs on all of Cybertron, for one, and he knew that she enjoyed his company, even looked forward to their stolen conversations. He wouldn't be surprised if she harbored a similar attraction, held back by social conventions or uncertainty if her feelings would be reciprocated. It would be up to him to make the first step, one she had probably been hoping for.

_("I'm sorry, milord, but Elita isn't in her office right now. Would you like to leave a message for her?"_

"_No. Where does she usually go?"_

"_My guess; she's probably taking her lunch break on the roof. She told me once that she likes to go up there to relax.")_

The only possible issue Elita might have, he mused as he headed to the elevator, was the fact that she had once been his instructor. Granted, that had been nearly four vorns ago, but as demonstrated by the feeble minded Phase Out, rumors would be certain to fly. Her reputation was important, and he wouldn't want it dirtied by slander. Still, he was reasonably certain he could convince her that it wouldn't be an issue.

Perhaps they could keep it quiet, he considered as he rode up. They would be able to see each other, he'd have her exclusively to himself, and she'd be able to keep her reputation untarnished. She'd probably want to take it slow – she struck him as the type – and he'd be willing to comply, to a point. He was hardly the romantic type, but he was pretty sure he could come up with _something_. Though, he might need to urge her along if she decided to drag her feet, he was only so patient after all.

Besides, he thought as he headed up the last set of stairs that opened to the roof, once she was his bondmate – and there was no doubt she would be eventually, he would settle for nothing less – no one would dare saying anything against her. If anyone tried…well, Phase Out would probably appreciate the company, he had been completely alone for a long time now.

_("You seem to be in an exceptionally good mood today, Elita. Something happen?"_

"_Hm? Well, yes, now that you mention it, something quite nice did happen today."_

"_Really? Tell me then."_

"_I left to have a nice lunch on the roof, but instead found myself occupied by a tall, devilishly handsome mech who simply refuses to let me refuel alone. But he brought rust sticks, so I forgave the intrusion."_

"_Really? Well if he brought rust sticks, he must be a good catch. It also sounds like he enjoys spending time with you. He probably doesn't get many chances, since you're both so busy."_

"_Hm, maybe. We should probably come up with a few new ideas to rectify that, Optimus.")_

All of Megatron's mental processes came to a screeching halt.

No…

No, this wasn't, this wasn't supposed to happen. This wasn't supposed to HAPPEN! She wasn't supposed to find someone else, she wasn't supposed to leave him behind, and she wasn't supposed to be with his _brother_!!

And yet there they were, Optimus with his arms loosely wrapped around her waist, her with her hands on his chest, both speaking softly to each other and completely oblivous to the tall silver mech frozen in the roof entryway. Even as Megatron watched, she lifted a small hand and touched Optimus' face with loving tenderness, and he nuzzled it with a smile.

Megatron retreated as fast as he could, before he did something drastic to one or both of them. They never even noticed him.

How dare she?

How dare she, how DARE she, HOW DARE SHE?!

Megatron slammed his fist against the wall of his office hard enough to leave a dent. How dare she make him think she valued him as more than a friend, how dare she seek another's arms, how dare she let another snare her spark that should have been _his_? He could have given her anything she wanted, anything she asked for, she could have been the consort of the most powerful mech on the planet!

But, she already was, wasn't she?

And THAT was what angered him the most.

If it had been anyone else, Megatron could have easily enticed her away with offers of something better. Anyone else, he could have forgiven her – how could she know he was finally coming for her? Anyone else, he could have made 'disappear' if the interloper was too stubborn to release what should be his.

But there was nothing he could offer, that Optimus couldn't as well.

The lamp on his desk went flying and shattered against the wall. The data pads nearly followed, but just as they were about to meet their end, Megatron stopped.

"_I fully intend to teach you how to turn every situation, every negotiation, and every conversation even, to your benefit."_

Can even this be turned to his favor? Probably the only reason Optimus had her first, was because he approached her first. That didn't mean they were ultimately compatible. Did he know her like Megatron did? Did he know of her darker side, her ruthless, ambitious, dangerous side? More importantly, would he be willing to accept them if he did? How long would it be before he rejected her darkness, or she his perpetual naiveté?

"_You cannot break down all walls, but you can slip through the cracks."_

Megatron put the data pad down.

He had heard nothing about this, not even rumors. Optimus and Elita were keeping a tight lid on this, probably for the same reasons he assumed Elita would have wanted had he been able to court her. So, as far as they knew, he still didn't know about them. He had no idea how long they'd been having this secret relationship, but they didn't seem particularly eager to let him in on it, so probably not that long. If they were keeping secret, it might be because they were testing the waters, making sure that they could work at all, without the scrutiny and judgment that would be sure to follow and hound them had they made it public.

So, if he was still ignorant, then he'd still believe she was available. If she was, then what could stop him from courting her anyway?

He'd have to be subtle about it – if he was too overt, it might prompt her to tell him about herself and Optimus, and he'd have to back off, since coming onto a femme already in a relationship, albeit a secret one, didn't make for a good impression. But if he did this right, he could insert himself into her constant thoughts, make himself an even bigger fixture in her life than he was already, make her realize that the Prime, for all his admittedly admirable qualities, was not the mech for her. Patience would be required, but the prize would be well worth it, and he suspected Elita, once all was said and done, would approve of his tactics. She was quite fond of the subtle, subversive approach.

With a grin, Megatron picked out a blank data pad and began to make notes, already anticipating the hunt.

He wanted her. He would have her.

Even if he had to take her.


	12. Transforming

**Meme:** Transforming  
**Universe:** G1, pre-war/post "War Dawn", depending how you look at it (because time travel's screwy like that).**  
Warnings:** Familiarity with aforementioned episode is assumed.**  
Summary:** New war, new bodies, new personalities…change in inevitable, but that doesn't make it any less terrifying.

This was inspired by a picture drawn by Ty-Chou at deviantart. Check it out at http:// ty-chou. deviantart. com/ art/ TF-Still-Beautiful-to-Me- 107141646. Be sure to remove the spaces.

Joor = 1 hour

* * *

The rose hued femme had been staring at her reflection in the little mirror for what felt like hours, and she still couldn't wrap her mind around it. She touched her face and helm, the reflection imitating her actions, the other femme both familiar and alien, like a distant relative she had never met but still resembled.

Quite frankly, she didn't know how to feel about…this. On one hand, she was grateful to be alive, and when she found out that Orion had been saved as well, she had nearly collapsed right then and there in relief. On the other hand, she wasn't who she used to be anymore, and not just physically either. She still felt light headed when she remembered what it was like when she first woke up after...everything.

oOoOoOoOoOo

She came to slowly, the darkness bleeding away from the harsh light over head. Her optics shuttered on and off as they adjusted, and she grimaced as pain laced her head, which throbbed dully. She felt…not in pain, mostly numbness, as if she had been shot up by neutralizers for pain and was just coming out of it.

When she was young, she got hit by a transport truck that hadn't been paying attention to where he was going. So she was very familiar with aforementioned sensation.

Something was blocking the light, and she on-lined her optics again to see the blurry image of someone she hadn't seen before, blue and purple, standing over her. It was his body blocking the light overhead. As she focused on him, his image sharpened, and she could see his concern melt into relief.

"Oh good, you're awake," he said with a smile, standing up again. "I was afraid the procedure had failed, you were out for such a long time. How do you feel?"

"Groggy," she said honestly. After a moment of contemplation, she added "Heavy."

It was true. She felt like her entire body was made of lead, and someone had replaced the fluids in her body with mercury so she wouldn't be able to lift so much as a finger. She attributed to the pain neutralizers she'd probably been shot up to the optics with. She must have been hurt pretty bad to need it so much. She almost wished she could remember why.

She wondered if it had anything to do with why her voice sounded so odd to her: too deep and low, not like her real, higher pitched voice. Maybe her audio's were still glitched?

If she was hurt, she must be in a medical facility somewhere. That would explain why she was lying on a table, or elevated berth, or something, with a strange but kindly face hovering over her.

"Well, that's to be expected after all you've been through," the stranger – medic? He didn't look like a medic, maybe he was a volunteer – said. "For awhile I wasn't sure you were going to survive. You'd been left alone for a long time without medical attention, after all, and getting hit by a fusion cannon is no small matter. You're lucky Megatron had been rushed. Had he been able to take aim, or if he hadn't been able to risk firing his cannon at full charge, you probably would have died instantly."

She blinked at him in dull confusion. "What? Megatron? What are you-"

FLASH!

_Orion coming into the warehouse with a tall silver stranger, one of the "flying robots" he and Dion had found so fascinating. Orion saying something, the stranger yelling "Attack!" and the warehouse being filled with dozens and dozens of armed Decepticons…_

_Orion, the stupid, brave fool, trying to stop him, stop the attack, but the stranger just brushed him off, and shot him, he shot him, he was going to kill him…_

_Didn't think, didn't pause, Dion tried to stop her, but all she could think of was 'keep him away from Orion,' distract him, give Orion a chance to get away, run Orion, get up and run before he – _

_The huge black gun on his arm, a small cannon really, swung around and fired, and suddenly she was flying back, landing roughly on her back and just barely missing crashing into the wall of stacked energon cubes behind her, smoke and sparks popping from the hole in her chassis just over her spark chamber and oh it hurt it hurt it hurt…_

_Couldn't focus, vision swimming in pain, but she could just see the tall red form of Orion trying to tackle the stranger in a rage (the fool why didn't he run?), only to be shot point blank and he fell and he didn't get up Orion why didn't you run? Why didn't you run when you had the chance why didn't you run and live why why why?_

_Everything fading in and out, trying to stay conscious, stay alive, need to live, move Arial move move move! But she can't move, she can barely stay on-line, can only watch the strange order for all the workers to be deactivated, every one of them, no one is going to be spared, no one, not her, not Orion, not their dear friend Dion…_

_Dion's been shot, one blast to the chest, just like Orion, just like herself, and he's not moving and the Decepicons are moving and shooting and the world was fading and where was Orion? Where was Orion, where was he where was he where was – _

**"Orion!"**

All sluggishness vanished, and the femme sat straight up, optics wide in panicked realization. She turned on the startled blue and purple mech. "Orion! What about Orion? And, and Dion, he was shot too, I remember seeing it. Where are they?!"

The mech held up his hands and took a step back, as if afraid the femme would attack him in her frantic worry. "It's okay, it's okay, Orion's fine. He was actually the first of you lot to be brought to me. It took a lot of work, but I was able to save his spark. He actually went straight out after Megatron – the mech who shot you all – as soon as he was on-lined. Last I heard, he was able to rally a charge to chase him and his Decepticons off."

"So…he's alright?"

"Very much so. He'll be back in a little bit, you can see him then."

"Oh thank Primus," she said, putting a hand over her spark. Orion was alive. She'll have kick his aft for running after Megatron so soon after nearly losing his life, but right now she was just going to be grateful they were both alive.

Both…alive…

She looked back at the stranger, dread welling up again. "You told me about Orion," she said slowly. "You haven't said anything about Dion."

His smile faded. She felt her fuel pump skip a beat. No…no, please no.

"He's being prepped for the operation right now," he told her. "I promise, I'm going to do everything in my power to save him, using a similar procedure to the one I used for the two of you. But I'm going to be honest; it had been a long shot with you, and I can't say for certain if he'll be able to survive it."

She felt her insides freeze in horror. No, no, no, she can't loose one of her best friends like that, it wasn't _right_, he can't-

She wrapped her arms around herself and huddled over. Fear and worry were twisting around in her tanks until she felt like she was going to be sick. The worst part was, there wasn't a slagging thing she could do to change anything. She was completely helpless to help, and that terrified her.

"How...why did this happened?" she asked in a strained voice. The mech shook his head slowly.

"I'm afraid I don't have any answers for you. All I've been able to figure out is that Megatron wanted energy for his army. It just so happened he picked your warehouse to raid."

Blind chance. Blind, stupid, chance, and Dion could still die for it.

"Where is he?" she asked.

He indicated behind him. "Just a few rooms away. But I'm sorry, I can't let you inside, not yet. When we're done with him, I'll let you know as soon as I can, I promise. That's the best I can do for you."

In other words, all she could do now was wait. Oh how she loathed the uncertainty of waiting.

She pulled her legs up and wrapped her arms around her knees, lowering her head, drawing in on herself like a cocoon on the work table. "Thanks for saving my life," she said in a near whisper. "But I think I need to be alone right now. When Orion gets back, can you just…just send him in here? Please?"

The mech took a few steps back. "Of course. I'll be returning to your friend now. If you need anything, one of my drones can probably get it for you. My name is Alpha Trion, by the way."

"I'm Ariel," she said, not looking at him. She frowned slightly. For some odd reason, her own name didn't sound right. She almost said it again aloud, just to check she had said it right – but she couldn't have possibly mispronounced her own name, could she?

So caught up in her own thoughts she was, she didn't see the odd look that crossed the mechs face.

"I don't know if this is the best time to mention this…" he said slowly, "but, there's something you need to know: Orion's…different now."

The pink femme raised her head marginally to look at Alpha Trion. "Being shot and almost killed, then brought back from the brink of death, would probably affect anyone," she said almost dryly. "But he'll always be my Orion."

Alpha Trion shook his head.

"That's not exactly what I meant. I couldn't just repair him, his spark would have extinguished. To save him, I had to rebuild him completely."

"Rebuild?" she repeated, straightening a little. "What do you mean 'rebuild?'"

Alpha Trion rubbed the back of his neck nervously. "It was the only option available. I had been working to create a design of Autobot's who'd be able to fight, as a new line of defense – I don't think the Guardian Robots are going to be able to stop this war by themselves, and most of the Autobots today simply weren't designed with warfare in mind, not like the Decepticons were. To save Orion, I had to rebuild and reformat him into…into a new mech, using my designs. Actually, saving him first was what allowed me to save you: I was able to use his schematics, which made rebuilding you much easier, it's probably the only reason why you survived. Your friend Dion is going to be a little more complicated though, some of his basic wiring is incompatible with-"

"Alpha. Trion." She said slowly, trying to quell the rising fear and anxiety by channelling it into mounting, tell-me-now-or-I'll-turn-you-inside-out-with-a-rusty-screwdriver anger. "What have you done to him? What have you done to _us_?"

"Nothing bad, I promise!" he said hurriedly. "It's just…here, hold on a minute."

He went over to a set of drawers and rummaged around for several seconds, searching for something. Finally he straightened with something in his hand, she couldn't see what. Turning around he came back to her, still holding the small object hidden in his hand.

"For what it's worth, it might help if you just think of it as an upgrade, to help you survive the coming war," he said, and he held out the small mirror. After a moment of hesitation, not sure if she actually wanted to know, she reached out and took it.

oOoOoOoOoOo

She had been staring at herself in that little mirror ever since. No matter how long she looked, it never seemed…_real_.

Maybe this was just one long and slightly weird hallucination, and she was still dying on the warehouse floor. If so, Primus had a really messed up sense of humor.

She finally let the mirror fall from her hands to land with a 'clank' on the tabletop she still sat on, one leg bent up which she rested her arm on. She let her head fall forward, not seeing anything, not paying attention to anything. A Guardian robot could have come blasting through the wall and she wouldn't have noticed until the roof landed on her head, maybe not even then.

Assuming this wasn't an energon-loss induced hallucination, her biggest concern wasn't what was going to happen next – she felt strangely dull about the future, like she literally could not think that far ahead yet – but how Orion was going to react when he saw her.

She lifted her hand and stared at it, flexing her fingers open and shut again.

It was hard to explain, and she couldn't put a finger on it, but even now, she already felt fundamentally…different.

No, she didn't just mean the new body – though that was plenty weird enough – but something more subtle, something in her mind. Her memories were all the same, untouched, but her personality…to say it was 'different' was too strong a word. It was more like she had 'matured' several centuries overnight. She examined her memories as Ariel, and she could already see the differences. Things that were once terribly important now seemed petty and childish, and thing that she never cared about before because they didn't directly affect her now seemed terribly important. Granted, having been recently shot and "killed" by one of those formally unimportant things would shift anyone's priorities by a bit. But the change, it was too drastic, too fast, and too _easy_. She didn't have to think about them, she didn't have to reach the conclusions on her own, the new mindset was just…there, like she had always had it, or been cultivating it for vorns already, and not just in a single night.

That scared her.

She drew her knees up and hugged herself tightly, feeling about ready to purge her empty tanks.

The fact of the matter was, she just wasn't "Ariel" anymore. Perhaps "Ariel" really had died in the warehouse during the attack, and she just didn't exist anymore. Alpha Trion had given her a new designation for her new body, her new life, but she didn't feel ready for that new name either. She felt like she was hovering between the two, unable to move back, unable to move forward, hovering on a thin piece of wire about to break. The thought of going on alone, of braving this terrifying, confusion new existence with no one but a stranger (a kind, patient stranger, but stranger nonetheless)…that terrified her more than anything.

And she'd have to go on alone, wouldn't she? Dion, he was always so good with rolling with the punches, taking things in stride, sometimes recklessly so, but even he couldn't just brush off something like this, having one of his friends suddenly _vorns_ more mature than him. It was too much, too drastic, too _fast_, and he would simply have no idea of how to react to it. And that was assuming he even survied the - _don't think about it_.

Worse than that, though, was what she knew would be the most likely outcome with Orion.

Orion...she imagined he would try to love her still, even in her new form and new personality, and if she were still "Ariel" she would have expected as much. But her newer self, more mature, and somehow wiser self, knew it wouldn't be fair to expect young Orion to stay with someone who used to be his girlfriend, and try to force himself to love the stranger that had replaced her.

Intellectually, she knew this. But, the thought of him leaving because of something she had no control over broke her spark, until she could almost literally feel the pain. She hugged herself a little tighter and curled into a little ball as if trying to hold her tearing spark together, and choked sob escaping. It wasn't fair, it just WASN'T fair! She didn't want this, she didn't want any of this! Why did Megatron have to ruin everything? He might still take away Dion, she was going to lose Orion, she was already loosing _herself_!

At that moment, she wanted nothing more than to punch Alpha Trion in the face. He brought her back for _this_??

She heard the door swish open. Speak of the Unmaker, looks like Alpha Trion had decided to come and check on her. It was way too soon for him to be coming to update her on Dion's condition, so he was probably here to make sure she didn't try to throw herself out the window or something equally dramatically stupid…though pushing _him_ out the window was looking tempting.

Probably shouldn't though. He might land on an innocent bystander.

"Alpha Trion, I don't mean to be rude, but right now you're the last bot I want to talk to right now," she said with an edge of coldness.

No response.

Confused and annoyed, she looked up to fix the older mech with a cold glare.

Except the visitor wasn't her dubious savior, but another mech entirely: a tall, broad shouldered, red and blue mech with a face mask, who nearly filled the entire doorframe with his bulk. He just stood there, in the door frame, not coming in, creepily enough, but just staring at her with wide optics.

"Who are you?" she asked point blank, when he didn't say or do anything. The mech blinked, and chuckled slightly, in a humorless, dare she say even self-deprecating, way.

"A very good question," he answered cryptically, stepping in through the door and letting it slide shut behind him.

It occurred to the femme that she was now alone in a room with a strange mech nearly twice her size. He seemed friendly enough so far, even if the staring was a little weird. Then again, Megatron had seemed friendly too, before he shot them all dead.

As casually as she could, she slid off the opposite side of the table, keeping it between herself and the stranger. He stopped, looking confused and…hurt? But she wasn't about to let her guard down just yet. She kept her fingers placed lightly on the table, trying to exude confidence she didn't feel, and ready to move to keep the table between them in case the large mech tried to come around.

"Alright you, listen carefully because I only have the patience to say this once; I'm not exaggerating when I say I've just had a really, really bad day. I'm not in the mood for creepy stares and cryptic answers. Either you tell me who you are or what you want within the next five seconds, or so help I'm going to call the authorities and dub you 'Dinky' for the reports because you're not giving me a name to use. I am not kidding."

The blue and red mech shuttered his optics, and it was almost as if a fog had cleared even as she watched.

"Ariel?"

Her servos locked up and her fluids froze. She couldn't even cycle air.

"That's really you, isn't it?" he said, coming toward her and moving to go around the table.

"W-who are you?" she said, scuttling back, her fuel pump thumping against her chassis. "How do you know me? I've never seen you before!"

The stranger stopped, and this time even with the face mask there was no mistaking the hurt in his optics.

"Ariel, it's me, Orion."

The entire world went silent and still.

Alpha Trion had explicitly told her he had rebuilt Orion as well, but for some reason, it had never crossed her mind that he would have been changed as drastically as she had been.

Hesitantly, cautiously, like a petro-rabbit coming out in the open, she slowly came out around the table toward the stranger than had taken her boyfriends place. In turn, he stayed completely still as if any movement would scare her away, watching her come in a little closer with both nervousness and hope.

She came to a stop just out of arms reach, just looking at him, trying to come to terms with this mech being her beloved Orion. Normally, she never would have believed it, would have accused him of a cruel joke. But after just barely, maybe, coming to grips with her own change, what choice did she have but to believe him?

They stood there for several seconds, the silence getting longer and more awkward. Finally, just to break the silence, she said the first thing that came to mind:

"You too?" she asked lamely. He gave a dry laugh.

"Yeah," he answered equally lamely.

Suddenly, she just felt dizzy, like her head was about to pop. She took a few steps back and reached a hand behind her searching for the table. He noticed and hurried forward, taking her shoulder and helping to guide her to the table. She leaned against it and held her head in her hands, willing the dizziness to go away. He stood next to her, hand on the shoulder but not doing anything else.

"What happened?" she asked. "Where were you? Alpha Trion, he told me a little, but he didn't know much. You didn't actually run after guns a blazing, did you?"

"Well…"

"Oh dear sweet Primus, you did...Alright, tell me everything."

She listened as he briefly described his encounter with Megatron, how he and a few others were able to hold them off…and how their new friends, the Arialbots, gave their lives so Megatron wouldn't take the energon still in the warehouse. She listened with rapt attention thoughout the whole thing.

"How in the name of Primus did you manage to do all that on the heels of…of this?" she gestured his new body. He actually looked a little sheepish.

"I think having that drive and a purpose, even a short term one, helped me. I didn't have time to think about it, pure and simple. I just, I couldn't just stay and let Megatron get away with what he did to you and Dion. I couldn't, and I will never forgive him for it."

His hand ghosted down and lightly, tentively settled over her hand, settling down a little more firmly when she didn't move her hand away.

"It didn't fully hit me until afterwards, once everything had calmed down." He went on. "I just didn't have time to understand the full extent of what had just happened. It took me nearly two joors just to summon the nerve to come in here."

The corner of her lip twitched up. That was just so like him, as Orion.

Wait. Two joors…

"Has Alpha Trion told you about Dion?" she asked quietly, looking up at him.

It was like watching a burden the size of a Guardian settle on his shoulders, his optics dimming.

She flipped her hand over to grasp his, giving it a little squeeze.

"He's going to be alright," she assured him confidence. "He would never give up so easily. He's going to pull through just so he can show us up."

His optics crinkled slightly in amusement at the rather accurate assessment of their friends determination, and he squeezed her hand back a little.

They stayed like that for several seconds, in silence.

"It's never going to be the same again, is it?" she said quietly. He understood immediately what she was talking about.

"No, it isn't," he agreed, already sounding weary. "Alpha Trion is right. This has been building up for a long time now, and if today wasn't the boiling point, then it's going to be coming soon, and Megatron will be spearheading it. I can't wait on the sidelines and just let that happen, not now that I can do something about it. Iacon's about to become a battle ground if we can't oust the Decepticons soon, but if you and Dion go to Praxus, or even Crystal City, the two of you should be safe for-"

"No fragging way in the pit."

He whipped his head around and stared at her. His shock was understandable; he had only ever heard her swear once, maybe twice in the entire time he's known her. When he saw the fiery glare she was shooting him with, he almost cringed back.

"I will NOT abide with 'staying on the sidelines' while you go risk your life to fight Megatron's uprising!" she went on harshly, standing straight and getting in front of him. "I won't let you just brush me to the side like that!"

She poked him hard in the middle of the chest with each point. "I will NOT hide from anyone, not even a monochromic overblown egomaniac, and YOU are completely blasted out of you CPU if you think you take on him AND his entire army all by yourself. You're going to need _every_ able-bodied fighter and specialist you can get your hands on, and you're starting with me. In fact, scratch that; you get your army, I'll get my army, and then it can be two on one."

He grabbed her upper arms, halting her. "I appreciate the offer, I truly do. But I can't do this if I'm worrying about you. I almost lost you once already, I won't allow you to throw your life away!"

She backed down a little, and tilted her head at him.

Slowly, she smiled in recognition.

"Well, if you feel so strongly, then you already understand how I feel too." She said, more gently. Her hand came up to lightly touch the mask that now covered his face, tracing the edges of it with her fingers. Her optics followed the trail, but his stayed trained on her.

"I almost lost you too today," she went on. "I don't want to lose you either. I won't let you die on me again. I'd never forgive you if you did."

Her optics flitted to his, and saw the recognition flicker across his face too. His optics crinkled in a smile.

"I can't tell if you've changed completely, or not at all," he said frankly, but with warmth.

Elita kept exploring the mask with a sad smile. "I think it's safe to say that neither of us are exactly who we once were. You've felt it too, haven't you? You're Orion, but you're not, and you won't be again. I'm Ariel, but I'm not, and I won't be again."

Her fingers stopped, and her voice lowered to a near whisper. "To be honest, it still scares me that I'm not quite 'me' anymore. I don't even know who 'I' am anymore."

His hand came up under her chin, making her look back up at him. "I know. It scares me too. But, we're not completely changed either. Your core personality, your spark, it's still the same, I can tell even now. I like to think I haven't changed that much either. I feel…older, but that's not the same becoming a completely different person, isn't it?"

"No," she agreed. "It's not. Still…still, I don't think I can feel comfortable being called 'Ariel' again. The name just doesn't suit me anymore. Ariel…she was practically a child, more concerned with what was right in front of her than the larger picture. She might take an interest in world happenings, but she never really cared for it. I suspect you feel the same about being called 'Orion.'"

"It does feel inappropriate somehow," he admitted. "That's probably why Alpha Trion took the liberty in giving us new designations."

"Hm," she agreed. "What name did he give you?"

He hesitated for only a second before answering. "Optimus. Optimus Prime."

"Optimus…" she said, sounding the name out. Somehow, it seemed right. She gave him a wry grin. "'Best First'? Sounds as though he has high expectations for you. Maybe as Megatron's heroic arch nemesis, Defender of Justice and Goodness And All Things Fluffy Everywhere."

"Primus, let's hope not." He groaned in good humor. "I don't think Cybertron's ready to have a former dock worker for a war hero. What about you?"

She paused, trying to remember the name Alpha Trion had mentioned. She hadn't been paying much attention, having been rather distracted at the time.

"Elita. Elita One."

Now it was his turn – Optimus' turn – to quirk and optic ridge. "'Chosen One?' Sounds like I'm not the only one with high expectations."

"Shush you. I hereby revoke all your rights to make fun of my name."

Whatever witty response Optimus had was cut off by Elita finding a little latch under his chin and accidentally pressing down too hard. With a soft click, the mask fell away and landed with a plop in her hand. The pair stared at the innocuous little piece of metal in blank surprise.

"…….So that's how it comes off." Optimus mused. "I was starting to think Alpha Trion forgot to make it removable."

"You'd think he'd try to mention it sometime before you starved. Or maybe he meant to hide your face, in case he wasn't quite as careful putting it back together." She teased.

Optimus quirked an optic ridge and grinned, putting his hands on her waist. "I'll have you know, I'm as devastatingly handsome as ever. And I don't here you complaining."

"So you keep telling yourself." She said, snaking a hand up his chest and shoulder. "But there's no telling what Alpha Trion might have done. Maybe he gave you the mask to hide a horrible mistake."

"You don't seem too repulsed." Optimus pointed out dryly. Elita grinned.

"Well, I don't see anything wrong…yet. I'm afraid a more thorough examination is going to be called for to be certain."

"A more thorough examination, you say?" Optimus repeated, drawing her a little closer, optics turning a darker blue. "Well, that sounds very important. Far be it for me to stop you."

With a sultry grin, Elita pulled Optimus down...

"I hope I'm not interrupting anything?"

The pair jerked away from each other as the door swished open to let in the speaking older mech. He stode in, but did a double take as he took note of Optimus and Elita's close proximity. His optics darkened in a blush as he realized that, yes, he _had_ been interrupting something.

"I, erm, I could, come back later, if you prefer," he stammered out. "I just thought you'd want to know that the repairs on your friend are complete."

"What?" Optimus said, straightening. "So he's...?"

"He made it through the procedure without a hitch." Alpha Trion told them. He took a step back through the door. "You can come see him now if you want. I think he'd appreciate having his friends with him right now."

"Of course! Just show us which room," Elita said, coming to the door and pulling along Optimus behind her by the hand.

"You can probably guess he's not exactly 'Dion' anymore either," Alpha Trion mentioned in passing.

"Of course," Elita said over her shoulder. "But he's still our friend, and we're not about to leave him behind either."

She wasn't yet totally okay with her world being turned upside like a bad roller coaster ride, and she was still a little scared about the drastic change in her life and future. But there still remained certain things that did not and would not change. So maybe, just maybe, as drastically different as everything was, as changed as her entire world and outlook was, everything could still turn out alright.


	13. Turned On

**AN:** So, I've got this notebook where I outlined by memes, drafted them, and saved them to be typed up at a later date. So what do I do? I lose the notebook. I'm hoping to find it again before I have to rewrite the ten or so memes I've already drafted. *sob*

Expect slower updates because of this.

This shot was inspired by reading the TV trope article about 'nakama's', in particular the Firefly dialogue in the articles heading. If you're familiar with the show, you may very well recognize said dialogue in here.

**Meme:** Turned On  
**Universe:** G1  
**Warnings:** …I'm starting to realize that I don't write stories that need warnings. Unless you count the way I completely screw around with the laws of physics and some such.  
**Summary:** Violet: Demolitions expert. Tempest: Long Range Combat Specialist. Elita One: the only bot alive who can keep them from shooting each other on sight.  
****

Guest Appearances:  
Tempest, by _A Midnight Dreary  
_Violet (finally!), by _Hiezen_

A Breem is about eight minutes long, just so ya'll know.

* * *

Cybertron is a world of layers and levels, and like its inhabitants, is far more that it appears, from the surface where its people lived, to the Core that housed the sleeping consciousness of Primus according to some.

In between were the maintenance levels, a labyrinth of rooms, halls, and shafts that criss-crossed the whole of Cyerbrtron like a hollow, underground web. Once, they had bustled with the activity of technicians and maintenance drones while hundreds of thousands of machines hummed away as they kept their world operating smoothly. Now, all but the most vital were silent, and all laid in total darkness – there was no energy left to spare for lights where no one goes.

In one dimly lit hallway lined with pipes on the walls and ceiling, a small crack dripped, dripped, dripped pale blue coolant to the floor below. The puddle had grown a fair good size, but there was no one left to repair the crack or clean the mess. No one cared anymore.

This is not to say all was completely dead.

_Splish-Splash!_

Dark blue pedes ran heedlessly through the liquid, come and gone in the time it took from the droplets to fly and fall.

_Splish-Splash! Splish-Splash!_

Two more sets of pedes speeding through, as swift and silent as the first. Their mission was wholly dependent on their ability to move fast and quiet, to remain completely undetected until the final moments.

Four orns ago, their intelligence came back with news that Shockwave had managed to find and capture about a dozen scattered Autobots and was holding them in a maximum security facility. Naturally, the Femme Contingent wasn't about to let him keep them there.

The plan was simple: Team A would place explosives along the underside of the outer wall of the facilities north side. It was comparatively more lightly guarded, and was the obvious point of entry. Hence, Shockwave would be expecting the approach there and would be quick to deploy his security forces on that section. Meanwhile, with everyone distracted, Team B would infiltrate the building quietly from the south side, find the prisoners, and get them out while Team A used cleverly placed explosives and a few potshots to keep Shockwave and his troops believing the real threat was on the other side of the building.

Simple on paper. Incredibly dangerous in practice. Especially for the diversion team, who were essentially turning themselves into live bait and running target if they couldn't get out of the line of fire fast enough. As such, the three bot team had been selected with the greatest of care.

"We're almost to the first point, ma'am. According to Vibes directions, we just need one last turn and we'll be right under them."

Violet: Demolitions expert and the sole Seeker member of the Contingent, quite possibly of the entire Autobot army, and the one holding the lantern to light up the pitch black halls. Mostly black and silver, she could still catch the optic with the lines of hot pink crossing her silver, emblem less wings. But what really made her unique were her purple hued optics she was named for, a color that promised no allegiances or loyalties to either Decepticons or Autobots, and one favored by mercenaries…and former mercenaries.

"Half a joor running around, and not a single 'Con trying to stop us. I thought this was supposed to be the _exciting_ assignment!"

Tempest: The Contingents Long-range Combat Specialist. A dark blue jet-former with down swept wings that hung from her shoulders like a cape, a regality that was enhanced by her considerable height – she was easily a head and shoulders above the Seeker. The rest of the Contingent had affectionately dubbed her, "The One Femme Calvary" because of her habit of carrying about enough firepower for three well-packed fighters and for being the first into a firefight and the last to leave. No surprise, she was one of Chromia's favorite drinking buddies.

"Believe it or not, Tempest, most bots would consider being chased by a few dozen heavily armed hostiles to be a _bad_ thing. But if we're lucky, you'll be able to take a few pot shots at angry Decepticons while Violet and I run for our lives."

Elita One: Commander of the Contingent with an overly dry sense of humor, the only bot left on the planet (and arguably off it) with the skill, determination, and charisma to create and hold together an army of her own, and bring together the best tactical finds and fiercest fighters to create a threat to Shockwaves stewardship he could not afford to ignore or hope to defeat.

She was also the only bot left with enough clout to keep the first two femmes from shooting each other on sight.

"Weapons out, you two. The closer we get, the more probably we'll be ambushed," Elita warned, taking out her own pistol as she scanned around herself. "This is the most dangerous part of the approach. Just be careful not to shoot one of us in the dark."

"Tempest's pointing her gun right at me!!"

"Don't worry Violet. I have complete and utter faith in your ability to dodge."

"_**Have a little **__**less**__** faith, why don't you?"**_

Not even bothering to turn around, Elita just stopped and slapped a hand over her optics.

In writing, theirs was the dream team for this mission in terms of packing the most skills and experiences in the smallest team possible. In terms of personal preferences and team dynamics…suffice to say they left much to be desired.

Not that Elita was surprised. Before becoming an Autobot formally, Violet had served as a mercenary and fought on both sides of the war, depending on who was paying the most. She favored the Decepticons a little more because of their high Seeker count. It wasn't until…certain events occurred that she finally decided to dedicate herself to one side, and Elita harbored no doubts regarding her loyalty. If anything, Violet had brought a unique perspective and invaluable experience to the tactical table.

Tempest, on the other hand, had been a staunch supporter from the very beginning. She was one of the most fiercely loyal soldiers any commander could ever ask for, and she harbored no mercy for the enemy. She did not forgive easily, and held little to no tolerance for Decepticon sympathizers, seeing it as a betrayal in the making.

Needless to say, Violet and Tempest did not get along with each other. At all.

Thank Primus they appreciated the importance of the mission enough to keep the verbal barbs to a minimum. Though Elita was pretty sure she was already developing a processor ache from it all.

"Alright, we're at the first point," Elita announced. "Positions everyone, we're on a tight schedule."

The Seeker promptly dropped to her knees and set the lamp down in front of her for optimal lighting, before pulling out several pieces of simple mechanical items from her subspace. With the grace of practiced ease and to the melody of rapid click-clack-snaps she started to assemble the first explosive.

Tempest stared at her kneeling teammate incredulously.

"You couldn't have assembled those things _before_ we left??"

"Not all explosives are safe to transport," Violet explained coolly. "Assembling them on site is the safest way to avoid a premature death by fiery explosion."

"Yeah, 'cos subspace is such a bad place to store delicate stuff, since it's so inclined to jostling," Tempest said sarcastically. "And here I thought it was a physical impossibility for stuff to even get jostled in sub space, even though NO ONE has EVER had anything ever BROKEN while they held it in sub space. Guess everything I ever learned as a youngling was a bold-faced lie, wasn't it?"

"It's impossible for items to be jostled or broken in sub space, true," Violet conceded archly. "But if you may recall, there is no way to remove items slowly or delicately – it's either in or out, and if, Primus forbidding, we were interrupted, I would prefer NOT to get distracted at the last moment and drop the high-grade bomb. Besides, each explosive only takes about 14 klicks to assemble when I'm not being distracted by an overbearing uneducated jet."

"What did you just say?!"

"Both of you be silent," Elita broke in sharply. "Violet, finish the explosive and get it up. Tempest, keep your guard on the back passage. Both of you, stop distracting each other."

The next eleven points went much the same, Tempests snarks being met with Violets passive-aggression. If their Commander hadn't been right there with them, they probably would have been throwing punches after the second point. Elita was starting to hope they would be ambushed, just so they could have something to keep the two flyers distracted.

"Done ma'am." Violet announced as she attached the last explosive to the tunnel roof.

"Finally. This operations been delayed long enough as it is," Tempest muttered none-too-quietly. This time, Violet opted to be the mature one and ignored her, taking the lead with the lamp as they made themselves scarce – it wouldn't be too much fun to still be in the blast area when the detonator went off.

"Is this far enough?" Elita asked almost a breem later, slowing to a stop.

Violet looked at the hand-held detonator in her free hand, with the bright red "press me!" button on top, with a considering if slightly apprehensive expression.

"According to my earlier calculations, yes," she said slowly. "But now that I've actually seen the tunnels for myself, I'm recommending we be at least three times as far from the blast area than we are now."

"Are you out of your processor?!" Tempest exclaimed angrily. "You just said that your stupid numbers say we're safe _here_!"

"And when dealing with multiple high-grade bombs in an underground tunnel, I for one would prefer to err on the extreme side of caution!" Violet snapped back, her patience finally beginning to wear thin.

"It'll take at least another couple of breems to get that far, and in case you missed the memo, this isn't just OUR mission here! Every klick we waste puts Vibes team in greater danger of being spotted and completely blowing our best chance to save the prisoners! Or have you forgotten the reason we're in these Primus-forsaken tunnels _in the first place_?"

"Oh, really? I never realized how important it was for us to work fast! I guess I was just too concerned with NOT being buried alive and either dying or being taken captive as hostages for Shockwave, because PRIMUS KNOWS he doesn't have enough leverage with the dozen Autobots he already has!"

"That's enough!" Elita snapped, but this time the femmes were too angry to hear her.

"Do you enjoy being such a smart aft, or is it just an ingrained habit from spending so much time with Decepticons?" Tempest shot venomously.

"No, I picked it up from spending too much time with Autobots who need a crowbar and two hands to pull their heads out of their afts!" Violet responded heatedly.

"Femmes? The mission? Bombs? Decepticons? Big booms?" Elita said dryly, crossing her arms and looking quite done with it all.

Predictably, mentions of 'big booms' grabbed Tempests attention…in the absolute worst way possible.

The tallest femme made a grab for the detonator Violet still held, grabbing her clenched fist at the same time. "Give me that, I'll set if off if you're too scared too."

Violet kept a vice-like grip on the device and tried to pull free of the determined jet. "Let go! You'll set of the explosives!"

"Did you not HEAR what I just said?? But hey, far be it for me to finish what the slag we came here to do!"

"Which will be completely moot point if you kill us all!"

"We're already outside the blast zone you tiny twit, remember?!"

"Nobody's ever died from being too careful!"

"I _beg_ to _differ_! Let go already!"

"No! YOU let go!"

"YOU let go!"

"I have an idea," Elita broke flatly. "Why don't you _both_ let go?"

The pink femme slapped a hand over the device with the obvious intent of twisting it out of both of their grasps. Unfortunately, Elita wasn't quite careful enough.

_BEEP!_

All three femmes froze.

"Violet," Elita asked, surprisingly calm. "Does that sound mean what I think it does?"

"Most likely, ma'am."

A dull sound of muffled explosions sounded with each successive blast louder and clearer than the last.

As one, the three femmes looked back the way they came. Far down the hall was a bright orange light, which was coming closer and brighter with every klick.

"Should we be able to see the explosions from outside the danger zone, Violet?"

"No ma'am."

"Guess we should have waited a little longer after all," Tempest admitted lightly.

With that established, they all proceeded to run for their lives.

The roar of the fire shooting down the narrow passage way sped after them, interspaced by rhythmic CRACK-BOOM's of unknown source, and no one needed to look back to know the inferno was catching up to them too fast. Within 30 klicks it would overwhelm them all.

"Slag it slag it slag it!" Tempest kept swearing.

"Left! Go left! NOW!" Elita shouted from the back.

"What??" Violet, at the front, tried to yell back over the increasing noise.

Tempest however didn't even hesitate. She lunged forward and grabbed the Seeker by the edge of one wing and throwing herself heavily to the left, dragging the screaming-in-pain Violet with her…falling right into the small access hall hidden in the shadows. Elita dove after them, and Tempest grabbed her and pulled her beneath herself, flaring her wings wide to cover Elita and Violet as the raging fire roared past.

oOoOoOo

"You know, now that I think about it, we weren't really in as much danger as I originally thought," Violet mused thoughtfully. "If the passage had been entirely sealed or just one long tube, we all would have been roasted alive. But when the explosives went off they each created a hole to the surface, which in turn acted as air ducts allowing the vast majority of the heat and pressure to escape upwards. What was left actually petered out quickly. The only way we could have been in trouble is if we had been dumb enough to stand absolutely still instead of getting out of the literal direct line of fire. If I had known that little hall was so close, I wouldn't have been nearly as worried."

"Is that what the 'crack-boom' noise was? The fire and pressure exploding upwards and outwards?"

"I believe so, yes. I should have realized it as soon as I heard the noise, but I wasn't thinking too clearly at the moment."

"So wait: while we just had to duck and cover, the 'Cons topside were running around geysers of fire erupting beneath their pedes?"

"More or less, yes."

"That…is…so…awesome! Primus, I wish I could have seen them running around all panicky! If I'd known it would have been that sweet, I might've waited longer 'till we were topside. Shockwave is so frazzled with trying to keep his facility from melting to slag and defending against the non-existent attack, he never even noticed his prisoners disappeared. Remind to get Vibes to tell us the details, seeing as we weren't able to make it to the party ourselves."

"It would have been fun to watch, Tempest. Too bad the explosives were detonated early."

"Yes Violet, quite indeed."

"Are either of you ever going to let that go?" Elita asked sardonically. The two flyers walking almost side by side in front (Tempest taking a turn carrying the lamp) paused to look back at their commander with expressions of mock puzzlement.

"Why Elita, what are you talking about?" Violet asked. "It's not as if we're blaming you for pressing the little red button while we were still technically inside the blast zone."

"Though the big kabooms _were_ a lot of fun," Tempest put in brightly. "You can never go wrong when you're blowing up 'Cons."

"Unless you accidently almost blow yourself up too."

"This is true."

Elita groaned and covered her optics with her hand. Oh yeah, it'll be vorns before they let her forget this one.

"How's your wing, Violet?" she asked, in an attempt to get of the hot seat for a klick.

Violet twitched the appendage. "Still stings a little, but nothing I need repairs for…"

She trailed off as a certain question finally occurred to her.

"Tempest, why'd you help me?" she asked. "The blast would have petered out after a few more klicks, too soon to catch up with me if I didn't stop. I probably could have out run it, or slag, out _flown_ it if it had occurred to me. But you didn't just pull me out of the way, you covered me too. Why'd you bother doing that for me?"

Tempest shrugged. "You're my teammate."

"But you don't even like me," Violet pressed. "Most orns you can't even stand to be in the same room as me. Why would you bother trying to help me?"

Now Tempest was giving her a decidedly odd look. "You're my teammate. Why are we still talking about this?"

Violet actually halted briefly, stunned by the novel sensation of having another bots loyalty and not necessarily their affection.

Behind them both, Elita chuckled.

_Splish-splash._

Tempest walked through the puddle, lost in her happy daydream of Decepticons being sent sky high without warning (such _delicious_ expressions!) and holding the lantern high for the two femmes following her – wouldn't want them to trip in the dark, after all.

_Splish-splash._

Violet walked through the puddle, heedless of her wet pedes, still trying to wrap her poor processor around the concept of someone like Tempest being loyal to her without liking her.

_Splish-splash._

Elita stepped into the puddle, and stopped.

Humming a little to herself, she pulled out of her subspace the small brown cube of malleable plastic she had packed away after this particular passage with the broken pipe had been finalized as their route of approach and departure. She worked it between her fingertips until it soften beneath the ministrations and warmth of friction. When she was satisfied, she reached up and pushed it in and around the coolant pipe crack. The dripping stopped as the plastic hardened and sealed into tan effective patch.

Satisfied, she continued after the others. Tempest had taken the light with her, but Elita had no qualms about walking in the pitch darkness. After traversing through theses tunnels for hundreds of vorns and going out at least twice as often as everyone else (outside of the Intelligence team), Elita had long ago memorized every step, turn, slip, grate, leak, and passage way down here.

Idly, she wondered how long it would take her teasing teammates to start wondering how Elita had managed to 'spot' the little access hall that hadn't been on their map and been completely obscured by the shadows. If they did, how long would it take them to wonder just how 'accidental' Elita's slip had been?

There was nothing like a crisis to learn a bot's true nature and feelings towards another, after all.


	14. Happy

**Meme:** Happy

**Universe:** G1, missing scene in "Search for Alpha Trion"

**Warnings:** I'm secretly a sappy romantic, and this is where it shows.

**Summary:** In "Search for Alpha Trion," Optimus (who thought she was dead) and Elita (who hadn't seen him in 4 million years) never got a proper reuniting scene…so I fixed it.

**AN**: The ending did NOT want to be written! I've sat on this stupid thing for months, because I liked it too much to scrap but I couldn't figure out how to end it. Rather, I knew where I wanted it to _go_, I just couldn't figure how to _get_ there. Anyway, I hope it meets everyone's expectations.

* * *

Orn – 1 day

Breem – 8.3 minutes

Klick – about 1 second

Elita knew perfectly well the dangers of using her time-stop ability. Primus, Alpha Trion practically made it a point of pride to mention it _every single time_ she contacted him, no matter what the purpose. Granted, he had every reason to be worried – Elita would die before she allowed anything to happen to even one of her Autobots, and the time-stop device was an incredibly useful and powerful tool…so long as she didn't complete drain her own spark to power it in the process.

Since Alpha Trion had been the one to develop it, he had a strong appreciation for the danger it presented, even if he understood the necessity of its use when Elita had no other recourse.

So, as a precaution and something of a compromise between them, it was decided that thirty klicks was the longest Elita should ever use the time-stop during a single orn, and even then, only under the direst of circumstances, like the planet blowing up. Though, really, Elita doubted there was much she could do about Cybertron spontaneously combusting.

In addition, she was never to pull another mech or femme into the field when she did activate it. The amount of energy she would have to expand would grow exponentially, which for her would be a Very Bad Thing.

In any case, when Starscream and his small group had taken her captive to Shockwaves tower, while that had been bad enough, it certainly hadn't warranted the use of her talent. Getting captured hadn't been in the plans, but she was nothing if not resourceful and opportunistic. The old base had been destroyed, but she knew her Contingent too well to think they had all been deactivated as well: they were too tough and wily to be taken out so easily. Even if Vaportrails phase device was damaged, or if Violet for some reason couldn't access her explosives, she trusted her Contingent to find a way. What they needed now was a new base, one Shockwave wouldn't be able to find. What better way to determine such a location than to take a look at the enemy's own maps, scanners, and data?

If she managed to slip away at the right time, she could turn this to her benefit. She could count on one hand how many times Shockwaves control room had been infiltrated. This could become a golden opportunity to hack into the gunformers systems and steal priceless information, plans, codes, anything her Contingent could use against him, information well worth the loss of one easily replaced base. With this in mind, she kept careful track of which hallways they used, which doors, how many floors, how many steps, how many turns they took. She estimated it would take maybe a breem and a third tops for her to go from the Control room to the exit, if she was quick.

Then Optimus came, and everything went out the proverbial window.

She would never remember consciously activating her time-stop ability, or even making the decision to do so. She didn't care anymore about Shockwaves vast computer systems, she didn't care about gaining a tactical advantage, she didn't care about Alpha Trion's warnings, she didn't even care that ten minutes was grossly beyond the point of no return even without bringing another into the time-stop field.

All she could think about was _'Don't let him die.'_

Nothing else mattered.

Nothing.

oOoOoOoOoOoOo

"_Wha-what happened?…Elita!"_

"_My special power…a weapon of last resource…it drains all of my…life force…"_

"_No!"_

"_Take me to…Alpha Trion…He's the only one…who can save me…"_

"_Hang on Elita!"_

"_I…I don't know how much…longer I can last…fading…fast…"_

"_Elita One…her life force is nearly drained…She did it to save me."_

"_I'll see what I can do, Prime. But it doesn't look good."_

"_How's Elita?"_

"_I've done all that I can for her."_

"_She's not…!"_

"_Now it's your turn to help her."_

"_Please, Elita. Reactivate."_

"_That should be enough Optimus, let her now."_

"_Alpha Trion, she's not-" _

"_Get back Optimus!"_

"_What's wrong? What's happening? You said the uplink would be enough to save her!"_

"_Leave now! I can't help her like this!"_

"_ELITA!"_

oOoOoOo

Blue optics onlined dimly, flickered then brightened as the femme regained consciousness, to the familiar sight of an old Autobot as familiar to her as her own Creators.

"We really need to stop meeting like this," she joked weakly with a little smile. Alpha Trion chuckled anyway, more in relief than humor.

"Alive, awake, coherent, and sarcastic – you are definitely on the mend."

"What can I say? I don't die easily."

"I should probably say something about how dangerous it was for you to use your power for such an extended time while pulling another bot into your field, and how it nearly killed you and destroyed some of the more delicate warnings of your body…but I strongly suspect I'd only be wasting energy if I tried."

"You would probably be right."

Elita pushed herself up. Alpha Trion made a move as if to stop her, but checked himself. If it was one thing she hated, it was being coddled and treated like she was made of crystal.

She looked around the room, searching, and it didn't take a mind reader to figure out what, or rather who, she was looking for.

"He's waiting outside the door," he told her, not quite able to hold back a grin as he crossed his arms. "You were lucky Optimus was the one to bring you in – your spark was fluctuating dangerously, and he is, literally, the only match that could have donated the energy to stabilize and save you."

'_Literally made for each other_.'

Mushy, even clichéd, but the inner romantic in her loved it anyway.

"He wanted to stay by you, but repairing the damage required all my concentration, and your Bonded is very…distracting." Alpha Trion explained as Elita swung her legs down, experimentally getting to her pedes. She felt a little wobbly, probably an effect of the intense energy drain and transfer, but other than that she felt fine.

"He offered to stand by the wall and give me my space, but that just made it worse," Alpha Trion went on casually as Elita took a few experimental steps to gauge her stabilizers and equilibrium. "Did you know he can loom over your shoulder from over fifty feet away?"

"That's because he has super powers." Elita answered him straight-faced. Satisfied that everything was working as it should, she gave Alpha Trion a questioning look.

"You are completely at full health again," he told her. "I have no reason to keep you here any longer. Now shoo. If you make him wait any longer he might very well decide to break the door down."

Alpha Trion was only half joking about the last part.

Elita ran for the door, her legs regaining their strength with movement and time. She reached out to palm the door open…and hesitated.

Before, she had been so concerned in saving Optimus, and staying conscious afterwards, she didn't have time to think about anything else. But now…

Well.

Now she was remembering that even for a member of a nigh immortal species, four million years was still a VERY long time to go without communications. Granted, that wasn't Optimus' fault. It wasn't like he planned to go into stasis, and he had no way of knowing there was anyone left on Cybertron to contact. She didn't fault him for that. The problem was, while he had spent the entire time asleep and unchanged, she hadn't. She fought, suffered, celebrated, grew…all while he slept oblivious.

Would he still recognize her as the same Elita he left behind?

She felt an intense and murderous surge of anger at Megatron for creating the situation with the war, at Starscream for forcing this moment into being when he called Optimus out, at Primus for life in general. Most of all, she was angry at herself for being so _weak_ and _scared_ like she hadn't been since she was Ariel.

Her hand dropped away from the door pad.

"Elita?" a soft, old voice ventured gently behind her. She could hear him coming closer, radiating concern.

To his shock, she turned and marched the other way toward the back door she knew he had leading out the medical room and, eventually, to the vast maintenance levels she could disappear in.

"Elita, where are you going?!" Alpha Trion exclaimed, reaching out and grabbing her arm as she went past. "You can't just leave like this! You and Optimus have been through too much together!"

"That's the problem, Alpha Trion," she said quietly, not looking at him. "We haven't 'been through' anything together for a very long time."

The ancient mech was silent.

Elita pulled her arm free, but she didn't move from her place. "The first time…Primus, the first time, when we were first upgraded, I thought I would die if I lost Orion because I had changed when he hadn't. Now, it's the same thing again, except there's no last minute reveal. Four million years, Alpha Trion. We shared the upgrade, but we can't share that time. I'm not, I'm not completely who I was when he left. I don't want to find out that I've changed too much even for him."

"Don't you think he deserves the chance to decide that for himself?" Alpha Trion asked gently. "For all you know, you're jumping straight to the worst case scenario and giving no thought to the other possibilities."

"I'm fighting a war, Alpha Trion," Elita said flatly. "Operating on the worst-case scenario is what I _do_."

"Perhaps, but this isn't the war."

"No, but…Primus, how many different ways can this possible turn out?" Elita started counting off on her fingers. "Fact: four million years is a _long_ time. Fact: we have been out of contact in that entire time. Fact: He's been in stasis, and thus is exactly the same as he was when he left while I…have not. I just…"

Elita curled her hands over her chest, protecting her spark, head coming down a little as she looked down into nothing, looking smaller and more vulnerable than Alpha Trion had ever seen her since she left behind Ariel.

He placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"You just, what?" he asked gently.

"…I just…I don't want to find out that it's too much this time." She finished quietly, off lining her optics.

Like a father comforting his child, Alpha Trion wrapped an arm around her shoulder and gently pulled her close. She was just barely taller than him, but that hardly mattered here and now, she still took the comfort and leaned her head against him.

"I can't offer much advice here, I'm afraid." He confessed. "There aren't many others who have been in your place. All I can do is ask one question: suppose I let you go now, and you leave without seeing Optimus again. Would you be able to forgive yourself for that?"

Elita raised her head slightly from Alpha Trion's shoulder, not looking at him, but considering.

Come tomorrow, what would she regret the most?

oOoOoOo

Optimus Prime sat on the bench outside the room where Alpha Trion worked desperately to save Elita One after complications arose from the transfer. His elbows were on his knees, his face in his hands, shoulders slumped, looking smaller and more vulnerable, and certainly feeling more _helpless_, than anyone has ever seen him. He'd done everything he could, as incredibly, woeful small amount it was, and there was literally nothing left to do but to wait and hope that it was enough. He wasn't used to this sensation, this waiting, floating in limbo feeling. He felt…numb. Against his will, he kept going over and over again in his memory what he could have done different: he could have gotten here faster, he could have fought harder to avoid capture, he could have taken a fraggin minute to stop and think and have a team ready to back him up so Elita wouldn't have been forced to take such drastic, life threatening measures for him.

If she…he spent all this time believing he had lost her in that explosion. Seeing her again, it was like she had come back from the dead. If he lost her again (without realizing it he had sunk even deeper into himself at the very thought), he honestly didn't think he'd be able to hold himself together.

Optimus was too deep into his own thoughts to even register the door opening with a soft hiss.

He did hear the light footsteps coming his way, slow, apprehensive even, as if nervous to approach.

Alpha Trion would not be approaching him so carefully if he had good news.

His hands started to tremble, and his tanks were rolling with sickening anxiety as the elder mech came to a stop next to him. Optimus tried to speak, but he couldn't bring himself to ask the question ('is Elita alright?') when he was too afraid he already knew the answer ('I'm so sorry, I did all I could…'). He couldn't even bring himself to move, to look at Alpha Trion in the optic. He just sat there, waiting (it was all he could do now, they all did everything they could).

He felt a hand settle lightly on his shoulder.

"Optimus?"

He froze.

That was not Alpha Trions voice.

The Prime snapped his head up and to the side where the voice had come from. Rather than the aged purple, red and silver mech, was a rose hued, concerned looking and achingly, beautifully familiar femme. He just stared at her with wide optics, not making a sound.

"Optimus?" Elita One said again, when he just kept staring blankly at her.

When he continued not to say anything, an uncertain Elita started to straighten up and remove her hand, for once failed by her usual confidence as her previous fears came roaring back that this was a mistake after all. She didn't get very far though, before Optimus had grabbed her hand. One second she was standing next to him, the next she gasped as he pulled her down roughly into his lap and completely enveloped her with his huge red arms, one around her waist holding her close, the other around her shoulders with his hand at the back of her head to hold her even closer.

"Optimus!" she exclaimed in reflexive surprise, her hands coming up to his chest. His response was to hold her tighter and bury his face into her helm. He didn't say anything, he just held her as if scared that she was going to slip out of his arms like so much sand and air.

It did not escape her notice that his hands were still trembling.

Elita's optics crinkled sadly as hands came up and wrapped around Optimus' neck to hold him back, burying herself in his hold and letting herself be swallowed up by him. They didn't speak; there were no words for this moment, only spark filled gratitude, silent joy, and, for Elita, the realization and hope that everything was going to be alright after all.

Neither of them noticed how Alpha Trion stood silently in the doorway, watching the pair hold each other like their lives depended on it and wearing a small, relieved smile. When Elita pulled back a little to speak to Optimus too softly for Alpha Trion to hear, and started fiddling the edge of his mask for the little catch she knew was there, the eldest mech stepped back and let the door close, granting them their much deserved privacy.

He had picked up activity back at the Darkmount, activity that revealed itself to be the Decepticons fighting the pinned down Autobots that had followed their leader through the warp gate. The femmes were already on their way to pull the mechs out of the proverbial fire, so it wasn't a drastic concern at the moment. But they were going to be needing their leaders pretty soon if they wanted a quick clean victory, and Alpha Trion knew them well enough to know that, the instant they learned their troops were in trouble, they'd jump and run to the rescue as fast as they could drive.

Alpha Trion would alert Optimus Prime and Elita One of the situation…in a moment or two, when they were done getting reacquainted with each other.

They deserved at least that much.


	15. Disheveled

**Meme:** Disheveled  
**Universe:** G1  
**Warnings:** Buckets and buckets of femmes. Also playing fast and loose with the prompt, but I liked this idea too much to let it go, and I didn't have any better fitting ideas.  
**Summary:** When two armies that have been operating independently for four million plus years converge, corporate culture clash is inevitable. Oh dear.

**Guest Starring in Order of Appearance:  
**_Aqua_, by **Flameshield  
**_Springshift_, by **Staringsideways** (image at the – gearsmith – (dot) deviantart (dot) com / art / Springshift – commission - 107580437  
_Sneakthief_, by **Fields of Heather  
**_Tempest_, by **A Midnight Dreary  
**_Wirecrash_, by **Quelara  
**_Sparklight_, by **Misao-CG  
**_Violet_, by **Hiezen**

_Knockout_ and _Vaportrail_ are the canonical green and orange femmes respectively.

* * *

When the Autobots on Earth decided it was high time to build a more permanent fortress to better protect the planet and fend off the Decepticons, it also provided a unique opportunity to support the Contingent still fighting Shockwave on Cybertron. They could now have supplies, energy, and reinforcements delivered as needed. Even better, with communications set up again and resources offered generously, if not quite "freely" by the humans, the Contingent could potentially set up new bases and try new tactics not open to them before.

With such an important partnership between the Army and the Contingent, Elita thought it would be best to bring the femmes with battle skills most suited to helping the Army in their alien environment and administrative skills needed to help get Autobot City going and create a usable communication and transit schedule. What she (and Optimus) had forgotten was the effect her bringing quite a few of her own troops to Earth would do to the population ratio, and how said ratio would affect some of the mechs.

All of a sudden, the rare and elusive femmes were EVERWHERE.

For a species were a mech could literally go a lifetime (depending on the generation) only seeing a femme perhaps a few times, and never more than a handful at once if even that, this new development was almost mind boggling.

Sideswipe had yet to stop grinning.

"Hey there," he greeted with his patented I'm-so-cool-and-confidant grin as he sidled up next to a sleek, graceful blue and teal-green femme. Said femme didn't even look up at him, she just kept rifling through the files as she tried to catalogue the latest shipment.

"You know," Sideswipe went on undeterred, leaning down a little to catch her vision (and showing of a rather flattering angle of himself completely on accident, of course), "I don't think I've ever met a femme with such golden optics before. It's very…exotic."

"You don't say," she replied flatly.

"Mm-hm. By the way, I'm Sideswipe."

"I'm bonded."

"Hi there, you must be Moonracer. You're a lot cuter in person, did you know that?"

"What?"

Further conversation was cut off when the first femme reached over and yanked Sideswipe back with a firm grip on the back of his collar struts.

"GAAK! What the slag?!"

"If I might make a suggestion, there is a lovely green femme in the rec room right now I think you would get along fabulously with," she said smoothly, as if she had not just nearly choked the taller frontliner. Sideswipe rubbed the back of his neck with a grimace as he eyed her suspiciously, but he had to ask:

"What makes you say that?"

"Call it intuition. Her name's Knockout."

Sideswipe was gone in less than a klick.

Moonracer edged up next to the older femme nervously. "Um, Aqua? Was that really necessary? I could have handled him myself, considering all the practice I've had with Powerglide. You didn't really have to sic him onto Knockout like that."

"Sideswipe isn't going to hurt your friend," Sunstreaker spoke up in a bored tone from across the room, reminding everyone that yes, he was there too and still not happy about it. "He likes to flirt, but he won't lay a hand on her."

Moonracer looked over at Sunstreaker. "Well, I guess that's good and all, but Knockout isn't the one I was worried about."

Aqua smirked.

Meanwhile, Sideswipe was just barely restraining himself from skipping down the hall (because skipping was not cool and charming), still grinning like a loon as he imagined what this mystery femme must be like, because she would have to be a real looker to honestly have a name like 'Knockout'!

The rec room wasn't terribly crowded, and a little asking around quickly directed him to a table in the corner where two mechs and three femmes were having a little conversation. Of the three femmes, only one of them was green, and this was the one Sideswipe zeroed in on. However, it quickly became apparent that what's-her-face had misled him a bit on what to expect.

"Wait, so you're Knockout?" Sideswipe asked, not even bothering to hide his disappointment.

The still seated, extremely ordinary, unremarkable green and white femme with the odd external audio's raised an optic ridge.

"Yes, I am," she said archly. "Got a problem with it?"

"Eh, not really, I guess," Sideswipe said carelessly with a shrug, still sounding disappointed but resigned to the situation. "It's just that, with a name like 'Knockout,' I was expecting and actual knockout."

Hound and Mirage gave Sideswipe identical aghast expressions for his incredible tactlessness, while Glyph and Firestar slapped their servos over their optics in identical motions because they knew what was going to happen next.

Knockout calmly set her cube down, and slowly stood to her full height, which nearly reached to Sideswipes chin.

**KA-POW!**

Sideswipe never even saw the punch; next thing he knew, he was literally flying backwards across the room, landing hard on his back and skidding a few more yards before he came to a stop with a throbbing face, staring up at the lights that kept spinning around making pretty patterns.

Said patterns resolved themselves into an upside down white face flanked by pink shoulder mounts.

"Did you know that Knockout has specialized pistons built into her arms that multiply the force behind each of her punches by more than ten times?" Arcee asked pleasantly.

No, Sideswipe did not know that. He was going to tell her this just as soon as the room stopped spinning.

A doorwinged blue mech and a bulky green femme, who had twisted around to watch the show, settled back down on the couch in casual fashion.

"Toldja Knockout was gonna throw the first punch," Springshift said, leaning back against the couch with one arm slung across the back, the other holding a cube to her lips. Her shorter companion nodded in reluctant agreement.

"Shame though. This is what I get for depending too much on Sunstreakers predictable aggression," Smokescreen said. "You'll get your winnings after my shift tonight."

"Nice."

"GET BACK HERE YOU PSYCHOTIC LITTLE THIEF!"

"Now now Tracksy sweetie pie, it's not my fault you don't lock up your stuff better!"

Springshift and Smokescreen twisted around again as a dark blue and black femme shrieking in laughter ran for dear life away from an enraged blue corvette. The speedy, lithe Supply Officer Sneaktheif would zig zag, leap, twist, pivot, and general have a grand old time running literal circles around the seething Tracks, and in one pass the pair on the couch caught a glimpse of the prize she was keeping away from her pursuer.

"You know, I get vanity, but does anyone else think that Tracks is over reacting just a little for a bit of wax?" Springshift questioned incredulously.

"Not when you consider that it's Pure Crystallian-light wax," Smokescreen noted, watching the pair jump over the still fallen Sideswipe. "Even during the Golden Age that stuff was rare and expensive, and ever since the manufacturers were either destroyed or converted to war prodution, no more have been made. The stuff is practically priceless, for anyone who cares for that kind of thing."

Springshift stared at him. "….How the flaming pit do you know about that about slagging wax??"

"I kept a small storage of it for trading purposes. You wouldn't believe the favors Tracks had to trade to get that little tub there."

"Ah."

They ducked in opposite directions as Sneakthief leapt over the couch like a champion athlete, leaving the heavier Tracks to take the long way around.

"…Double or nothing Tracks wins this little confrontation of theirs?" Smokescreen proposed. Springshift raised an optic ridge at him.

"You sure? The only reason Tracks even knows she has his precious wax is because Sneakthief is playing around with him. The klick she gets bored of it, she's going to disappear into thin air and Tracks is going to find the stuff back in his room in the exact same place he left it this morning. Pit, I've seen her do it half a dozen times back home."

Smokescreen shrugged. "Is it so wrong for me to have a little faith in Tracks persistence? He won't be so easy to shake off."

Springshift considered, and then held a hand out. "Double or nothing then."

They shook on it just as Sneakthief led the merry chase out of the rec room and back to the halls.

"Seriously though, Smokey, what makes you so sure Tracks has any chance at catching Sneakthief?" Springshift asked.

"Because, my dear, Tracks is a smart bot and he's going to realize sooner than later that he can fly a lot faster than she can run."

"….Well frag."

Laughter and curses reverberated far down the hall, and Vaportrail caught the blue and black blurs running past the open door. The former Towers femme made a static sound of high-class disgust.

"How immature," she sniffed.

"You get used to stuff like this after awhile. I don't think anyone else even notices anymore."

"You have my sincere condolences then," Vaportrail said sincerely. But then she started, and looked around the decidedly empty room. Who was that just speaking now?

"Mirage, if that's you, talking to disembodied voices does not amuse me," she said archly.

"Mirage's with Hound and, uh, Firestar I think. I'm down here."

Vaportrail looked down, expecting a minibot. Instead, the mystery speaker was a small, organic creature with blue and white coverings and yellow fluffy stuff growing out of its head.

The orange and purple femme practically leapt back like a startled cat. "Holy Primus, it's an organic!!"

The thing stared at Vaportrail oddly. "Um, yeah. Human actually. The native dominant species of the planet you're currently on?"

"What are you DOING here?!"

The human raised a tiny optic ridge. "I've been standing here for almost twenty minutes. How did you not notice me until now?"

It came forward a few steps, but Vaportrail backed up the same amount of space.

"No no no, don't come any closer," she ordered, making a shooing motion with her hands. "I know about organics: you're messy and smelly and you ooze stuff all over the place!"

"What the heck kind of literature have you been reading?" it said, putting its hands on its hips as if sounding indignant. "I'm not about to vomit on you, and until I get cut up, I'm not going to bleed on you either. Look, see, I'm going to – oh for crying out loud, it's not like you're going to melt if I touch you're freaking foot!"

"You excrete oils and mucus and all kinds of nasty things!" Vaportrail shot back, her voice increasingly tinny as she backed up to the table behind her. To the human's clear disbelief, the femme actually crawled onto it like a girl trying to get away from a mouse.

"Now scat! Go away and leave me alone!"

The human threw up its hands in exasperation. "Fine! You win! Just let me find my boyfriend and we'll get out of your way!"

"Thank you very…wait. 'Boyfriend?' There's another one in here?"

With stunned realization and mounting horror, Vaportrail slowly turned and looked down behind her.

A taller, broader human was mere inches away from her heel with a devilishly grin.

"Imma gonna lick you!"

"_AAIIIEEEEEEEE!"_

Tempest swirled her head around. "Hey Cliffjumper, did you hear something?"

"Nope. Alright, the little green target moving target in the far back left corner. Loser buys winner the first round."

Tempest promptly forgot about the little high pitched sound she thought she might have heard and pulled out her faithful Big Rusty out of Subspace, lined up for the shot, and fired with precision marksman ship. As testament to her experience and skill, the entire process took less than four seconds.

**BOOM!**

The blue jet hefted her gun and smirked down at the red minibot nearly a third her size, her downward swept wings twitching slightly in barely suppressed pleasure. "Perfect shot. Beat that."

"You can't say it was a 'perfect shot' when you destroyed the entire target," Cliffjumper pointed out as he eyed the liberally scattered, confetti like remains of the little green target.

Tempest answered with a casual, one shoulder shrug.

"Eh, same difference. Old Rusty gets the job done either way." She patted the oversized gun fondly.

Cliffjumper raised an optic ridge.

"Out of curiosity, is that your _only_ gun?" he asked.

The room temperature dropped so sharply little ice crystals were nearly forming on the walls.

"You got a problem with my gun?" she asked dangerously.

"Not the gun itself," Cliffjumper clarified. "It just never made sense to me why anyone would only bother to carry one or two guns, even if it is practically is a small cannon."

"How many guns do _you_ carry then?" she asked in challenge, still with the dangerous edge to her tone.

Cliffjumper took two steps back.

Blip. From his subspace he retrieved a minibot sized rifle, standard issue in the army but with a modified scope and muzzle. He laid it out on its side on the floor, as if putting it on display for the skeptical Tempests benefit.

Blip. Out came a matching pair of pistols, also standard issue but usually found with recon specialists, not something she'd have expected someone like Cliffjumper to carry.

Blip. A 47-K shotgun with a pit of a kickback but incredible force, meant for those with a great deal of firearm experience.

Blip. Tempests brow shot up at this one - a Silver Matrine 82-D2 sniper rifle, complete with stands to hold the obscenely long and expensive rifle steady. It was too long for easy handling, but it could hit targets the size of a bots pinky. It was _definitely_ not regulation weaponry.

Blip. Blip. Blip.

Cliffjumper just kept pulling one gun out after another, laying them out until they littered the floor all around Tempests feet – assault rifles, shot guns, pistols, sniper rifles, grenades, even a few knives for variety – until there was enough firepower spread out to fill a small to mid-sized munitions store. Satisfied that he had emptied out his subspace, Cliffjumper crossed his arms and smirked up at the slacked jawed femme.

"Any questions?" he asked cheekily.

Tempest was unable to reply, too busy staring at an Avlon Grey 4451-Beta assault rifle that _had_ to have been picked off a Decepticon.

For his part, Cliffjumper selected a favorite shotgun of his, programmed a new target identical to the one Tempest had so recently decimated, and lined up his shot to match her own to see if he couldn't do just as well.

Said femme absorbed the vast array of firepower casually displayed before her, up to the minibot, back to the guns, then at Cliffjumper again as he readied for his shot with a gun almost as big as he was, which comparatively made the weapon almost as big as Old Rusty.

"I think I love you." She said sincerely.

Cliffjumper jerked and his shot went wide.

**BOOM!**

Wirecrash snapped her head up.

"What was that?" She exclaimed.

"It came from the south east side of the ship and the external defenses systems haven't gone off," Prowl rattled off. "Most likely it's Cliffjumper and Tempest having that shoot off of theirs in the firing range, or whatever it is they were calling it."

"What he said," Ratchet said distractedly. "Fraggit Sideswipe, what the Pit possessed you to try and use the pistons in your pile drivers to win an _arm wrestling match_?"

"It was a matter of pride!" Sideswipe insisted, even with his right arm was practically dissembled to the bare bones on the table, so to speak. Against the wall, holding a sore arm close and waiting a turn, Knockout nodded in agreement.

Ratchet shuttered his optics and pinched the bridge of his nose, cycling a long breath of air in an attempt to keep calm.

"Alright you two, I'm only going to say this once so you'd better pay attention: Sideswipes pile drivers and Knockouts pistons are both designed for intense bursts, or even rapid successive bursts of energy focused on a single point, such as punching. They are NOT designed for drawn out stresses such as pulling or pushing or _fragging arm wrestling_ against bots who _also have pistons in their arms_. It doesn't do any good, and all you do is warp and mess up the internals of your own arms. How the Pit do neither of you know this already?"

"It was an experiment," Knockout muttered, not quietly enough.

"If either of you show up in my med bay because of an 'experiment' again, you're walking out of here without _either_ of your arms," Ratchet warmed ominously.

Prowl twisted his head around to look at the orange medic femme behind him out of the corner of one optic. "You trained under Ratchet, you said?"

"During my internship, yes," Wirecrash answered as she adjusted and aligned the tacticians wings for his regular checkup. "I ah, went through a bit of a career change, and he was the only mentor left available – he scared off all the other med students. I spent about a vorn working under him before I got my license, and spent a few more working for him before I transferred to Elita's unit."

"After working so closely alongside one another for so long, I'm a little surprised you didn't pick up more of his…unique mannerisms," Prowl admitted.

Wirecrash shrugged. "I guess it's because I'm such a spark-felt pacifist; I just don't get riled up easily. Besides, I don't think I have the energy for that kind of temperament. Bit of a shame though, since I can't put the fear of Primus in my patients the way Ratchet can. Alright, that should be it. Tell me how it feels."

Prowl slid off the table and gently moved his wings about experimentally. "Smooth and pain free. Thank you Wirecrash."

The femme waved off the gratitude. "It's easy to work when I have a patient who so compliant."

**BOOM!**

"I hope those two don't end up destroying the shooting range," Wirescrash said a little worriedly, as the aftershocks rattled a few of the containers lined up by the walls.

Prowl frowned as one wing twitched. "That didn't come from the firing range…"

The med bay doors slid open to let in a smoking, sooty, slightly sparking Wheeljack.

"Hi everyone, sorry about that!" Wheeljack said cheerfully, waving at everyone inside with his right hand…which he was holding in his left.

"HOLY PRIMUS FRAGGING PIT, WHAT THE SLAG IS _WRONG_ WITH YOU?"

Prowl stared.

Sideswipe stared.

Knockout stared.

Ratchet stared.

Wheeljack flinched back and made as if to escape, but he wasn't fast enough to evade the white and orange hand that clamped down on one of his vocal indicators, pulling him in roughly and dragging him to the berth that Prowl was quickly (and wisely) vacating. She pushed the engineer roughly to the berth, forcing him to sit.

"It's been forty eight thousand, one hundred and ninety three vorns since I last saw you, and you're still blowing yourself to pieces!" Wirecrash ranted as she grabbed tools viciously, almost like she was attacking the work bench. "In all that time I can't believe you still haven't learned to be just a BIT more cautious! Fraggit, this is why I quit training to be an engineer and switched to medical school – I'd rather deal with Ratchet that risk getting blown up by YOU on a frigging daily basis!"

"Um, actually, I spent the last 4 million years in stasis, so for me it's only been less than a decade," Wheeljack tried to say meekly.

"_That is completely irrelevant!" _

While Wirecrash ripped poor Wheeljack a new manifold and Sideswipe and Knockout watched with mounting horror and recognition, Ratchet continued reassembling Sideswipes arm like nothing was happening. Prowl, the last sane mech in the room, took the opportunity to make his escape.

"It would seem Wirecrash picked up a few more of her mentors quirks than she thought," he noted to himself when he was safely down the hall.

Prowl needed to get to the tactical room, but he paused as he approached the closed inventory room. Jazz was gone for the day, and had asked Prowl to return the radio transmitter he had taken out earlier that week for a scouting mission and never returned (how could someone as smart and detailed as Jazz still be so absent minded sometimes?) if he had the chance. Well, Prowl was here, and he was 1.3 minutes ahead of schedule anyway. Running for your life tended to speed up your day.

Prowl checked his subspace to make sure he had the item on him. Still holding it, he keyed the door open, and stopped.

Instead of a dimly lit, overstuffed but peacefully quiet inventory room, the lights were on as bright as the settings could go, flashing off a blue femme with black and white highlights and the wings that twitched erratically, betraying her distress…as if the way she frantically searched every shelf and ran around like a panicked bird hadn't been enough of a giveaway.

"Has something been stolen?" Prowl asked sharply as he came in, grabbing the femmes attention.

The femme immediately stopped her frantic motions, spun around and stood at attention like a good soldier. She even started to answer ("We're missing a…"), until her optics flitted down to the transmitter still in Prowls hands.

Prowl's memories of what happened next would always be a bit fuzzy.

The next thing he knew, he was stumbling back out the door until he tripped and fell hard on his recently adjusted wings. Between that and his newly crushed nose, he was left seeing stars while the femme stood over him, framed in the doorway with one hand still up from the knockout punch and the other cradling the transmitter close like a mother guarding her sparkling.

"The next time you decide to take something out of inventory, sign out for it like everybody else has to!" she snapped at him, wings raised high and making her look larger than normal. "I just spend the last half joor looking for a missing transmitter that wasn't so missing after all, thank you very much! Just WHO do you think you are? The Prime?"

_Ahhh_…now Prowl realized who this femme was, if the stories he'd been hearing from the rest of the Contingent were true.

"I don't think we've ever had a chance to be properly introduced," Prowl said as he stood back up, one hand occupied with feeling his tender olfactory sensors. "You must be Sparklight, the Contingent Security Director. I'm Prowl."

Sparklight gaped at him.

"You're Prowl?" she asked meekly.

"Yes."

"As in the Autobot Second in Command Prowl?"

"Yes."

One.

Two.

Three.

Sparklight hopped backwards into the inventory room and shut the door as if raising a barrier against a coming enemy horde. Two beeps, and the green light over the keypad flashed to red to show the door had been locked. Strictly speaking, Sparklight shouldn't have been able to do that from the inside, but it was amazing what a bot could do if they were desperate enough. Prowl strongly suspected no one was going to see the femme again for a day or two, longer if she had the good fortune of having a cube or two in her subspace.

Turning, he headed back the way he came towards the med bay, turning on his comm. as he did so. So much for the 1.3 extra minutes in his day.

: : Violet, I'm afraid I'm going to have to post pone our meeting, : : he said. : : I hope to be down there within a half hour or so. Is that agreeable with you? : :

Violet grimaced, but she didn't let it color her tone when she answered.

: : It's alright, I understand. I can use the time to play with a couple of extra scenarios and be extra extra prepared for when you do make it. : :

: : Good. Again, my apologies. : :

: : It's alright Prowl. I'll see you in a bit then. : :

When Prowl cut the line, the defected Seeker femme focused every iota of her attention and concentration on the holographic topographical map display in front of her, spinning around the three dimensional image to focus on what she wanted and doing her level best to block out all other distractions. She and Prowl were going to go over ways to prepare for the foundation of Autobot city with carefully placed explosives to level out the area. Normally, she would have been fine with the extra time – she liked playing with the Arks toys – but today was a little bit different.

"So you like playing with bombs then? That's just great, you can lay out a line of explosives and take out an entire battalion of 'Cons and not even get your servos dirty. And if you 'accidently' blew up a few of your own Autobot comrades, you can just say 'oops, hope that doesn't happen again!', right?"

Violet wasn't annoyed that Prowl was delayed. Violet was annoyed because the high ranking officer wasn't coming to make the small annoying plane go _away_.

And blocking him out was getting harder and harder.

"Yeah, you could just have an accident every time there was some 'bot you didn't like out on the field," Slingshot drawled on casually. "Real common occurrence with the Decepticons, back stabbing each other all the time. 'Course, that's just a rumor I've heard, but I should probably run it past the expert. So tell me Violet, are the 'Cons really like that, or is that just bad press?"

Violet brought up the possible blast locations one at a time so they lit up as red dots against the green field and mountains.

"I mean, not a whole lot of mechs or femmes get to see both sides of the fence," Slingshot went one as he came around the table. He poked a finger through one of the cliffs casually. "Real learning experience I bet, especially when you spend, what, a millennia or two just straddling the fence? Boy, you'd think after the first city or two blew up you'd be able to make up your mind pretty quick about where you wanted to stand."

Violets hands twitched, but she kept entirely focused on entering the calculations to predict the flow and direction of possible landslides because she was far too professional and disciplined to be distracted by imagining herself throttling a certain amped up big-mouthed wanna-be jet.

Yep. Far too disciplined indeed.

"Seriously though, how do you look anyone in the optic, after everything you did with the Decepticons?" Slingshot asked in mock sincerity. "I bet Elita made you jump through a dozen hoops just to let you into the Contingent. Or maybe you brought a present to show you were serious this time, no really.

"Come to think of you, you Seekers come in threes usually, don't you? Some big cultural thing, from what I hear. What, did your partners get sick of ya, or did you bump them off when you turned traitor?"

Violets optics flashed white.

Air Raid walked into the room just in time to see the Seeker punt his teammate across the room.

oOoOoOo

Elita sat delicately perched over the edge of the Ark hull sticking out from the mountain, directly over the main entrance, watching the gorgeous sunset paint swathes of orange and red on the underbellies of the clouds and on the desert sands, stretching out shadows amongst the varied shapes of the terrain. It was simply breathtaking, like nothing she could see on Cybertron. She decided this right here alone would have almost been worth the trip.

A shimmering purple cube appeared next to her head. She turned to see the other perk of her trip.

"High grade, on the house," Optimus said, like a waiter at an expensive restaurant. Elita smiled as she took the offering.

Optimus settled down next to her, letting his legs hang over the edge and wrapping an arm around Elita's waist, tugging her just a little closer. She obliged by snuggling up next to him.

Privately, they both took a moment to be grateful to their crews for encouraging their commanders to take a little personal time together. Actually, 'encouraging' would be putting it lightly; some of them were entirely too excited about getting them out of the Ark for a day, stopping just short of picking them up and throwing them out. Sideswipe had even donated some of his High Grade for the occasion, though Optimus suspected this had more to do with the weird friendship-rivalry dynamic he and Elita had somehow created when Optimus hadn't been looking. Elita for her part couldn't help but grin every time she remembered how "enthusiastic" Aqua, Sneakthief and Moonracer had been about setting up this date for them.

Thinking about them brought back a certain small but persistent concern, one that wouldn't go away until she finally acquiesced to voicing it out loud.

"Are you sure it's alright for the both of us to be away like this?" she asked a little uncertainly.

"We're not exactly 'away', considering that everyone else is just inside the Ark." Optimus reminded her with a bit of humor.

"You know what I mean," Elita told him dryly. "This may be irrational, but I feel like a Creator leaving her younglings home alone for the first time."

Optimus chuckled. "I've met some of your femmes, and if they're half as bad as some of my mechs, I don't blame you. Still, it's not like we're leaving them completely to their own devices; we have plenty of level-headed, responsible mechs and femmes to balance out the more rowdy members of our crews. How bad could they possibly get in a couple of hours?"

oOoOoOo

"Outrun THIS you thief!"

"HEY! Flying indoors is totally cheating! Are you trying to KILL ME?!"

"WOOGIE WOOGIE WOOGIE!"

"Stop chasing me you psychotic little human!"

"Cliffy, I think we're out of targets."

"Tempest, I think you just blew a hole in the wall."

"Tell me Wheeljack, are you TRYING to go offline in the most creative fashion of all time, or are you just a masochist?! And stop squirming or I swear to Primus in Cybertron I am going to RIVIT you to the berth!"

"Sparklight, it's Springshift. I know you're a bit embarrassed that you punched out the Autobot Second in Command and didn't even know it was him until it was too late, but if you don't come out of there I'm going to setting the temperature settings in there to subzero. That is not a joke."

"Alright, we've got two arms again. How about two out of three, loser has to explain to Ratchet why our arms are all busted up again?"

"You're on."

"I'm sorry for the delay Violet, I was…Violet, why are you sitting on top of two of the Arielbots?"

oOoOoOo

"Yes, I suppose you're right," Elita admitted, relaxing again against her bondmate.


End file.
